THE Construction Industry Training Board has launched a campaign to get young people to join the construction industry – as new stats show 20 per cent of the sector’s workforce is set to retire in the next decade .

Can You Dig It? has been timed to coincide with the exam results season, and encourages Scottish students to consider a construction career. Young people are being urged to take a special personality quiz on the Go Construct website to find out which of the over 150 construction careers is right for them.

The need for new talent is clear. CITB statistics show that the industry in Scotland currently employs almost 16,000 people aged 60 or over and around 15,000 aged 55-59. As these workers move towards retirement, there is an excellent opportunity for young jobseekers, as well as more experienced people considering a career change.

The campaign also aims to make the industry more diverse – as construction currently has a workforce of only 14 per cent female and six per cent from an ethnic minority background, and that needs to change.

The quiz can be found at www.goconstruct.org/personality-quiz.