Trade starts scarce as worries persist

Finding a good apprenticeship has always been hard.

And it’s harder this year than most.

The number of apprentices being taken on, in Australia’s building, is now so restricted that the housing shortage, already estimated to be about 200,000 homes, is almost certain to get worse over the next five to 10 years.

The Housing Industry Association says the apprentice intake, in the residential building sector, stalled in the June quarter of this year.

This is just one more sign that business confidence, too, is still being affected by the shakeout which followed the global financial crisis.

This was evident too, in new capital expenditure figures, that the Australian Bureau of Statistics has just released.

These showed that new capital spending fell by 4 per cent in the June quarter of this year.  The fall surprised many economists as Australia’s mining industry, in particular, is trading very strongly.

Rising interest rates- and worries about the super profits tax -  that the Federal government then proposed for the industry, are thought to have contributed to this fall.

The present impasse, in Australia’s Federal politics, also presents new elements of risk.

Alan Langford, the chief economist of Bankwest, says the deadlock in Canberra leaves the Australian economy vulnerable, if there is a sudden jump in global risk aversion.

Mr Langford said  that would be particularly so if a viable minority government cannot be established quickly.