Girls now make up the next proportion of the development workforce than at any time since official information started.

The development workforce was 18.8 per cent feminine in April to June 2023, up 1.5 per cent on the earlier quarter, based on the Workplace for Nationwide Statistics (ONS). Earlier than the pandemic this determine stood at 14.5 per cent.

The upper relative stage of girls is partly defined by a slight lower within the variety of males working within the business up to now few years. Round 1.8 million males have been have been employed within the development business within the final quarter, 200,000 fewer than within the first three months of 2020.

Whereas male employment dropped throughout the pandemic and has but to get better, the variety of girls employed in development climbed over the identical interval.

Round 340,000 girls have been recorded as working within the development business within the second quarter of 2023, a rise of 41,000 for the reason that final three months earlier than the Covid lockdown (January to March 2020).

When the ONS began compiling information on the development business’s gender breakdown in 1997, there have been 242,000 girls workers, representing 14.6 per cent of the full workforce.

Girls in Property chair Chithra Marsh mentioned: “There could possibly be just a few elements at play right here. We’ve got an ageing inhabitants and, with it, a gaggle of senior males who’ve retired from the business, dropping the male stats down and in flip growing the feminine break up.

“On the different finish of the profession spectrum, we have now the ladies who’re coming into the business after commencement. We had a number of development trainees as our Girls in Property Nationwide Pupil finalists this yr, and it was an identical state of affairs final yr, which is sweet information for the longer term.

“There may be additionally the likelihood that retention of girls could possibly be enhancing at mid-career, because the business seeks to enhance flexibility and the profession pipeline.”

The ONS Annual Inhabitants Survey, which asks a pattern of the inhabitants about their working lives, presents a barely totally different image. As a result of the examine measures information for the entire nation from a smaller pattern dimension, it must be taken as extra of a tough image of the business’s gender break up.

Primarily based on this information, the ONS estimates that within the yr to March 2023, solely 11,800 out of 710,300 development tradespeople have been girls.

The info suggests that ladies in development usually tend to take up venture administration roles.

Girls represented 13 per cent of development venture managers or related skilled jobs within the yr to Might 2022, though this determine dropped to 12 per cent in the identical interval this yr, based on Annual Inhabitants Survey estimates.

So few girls have been recorded as carpenters and joiners that the ONS was not capable of reliably extrapolate what number of there are, regardless of there being an estimated 197,000 folks in these roles within the UK.

No girls stonemasons or groundworkers have been recorded in both yr.