The Datum Report

Occupation 5319 · Skilled trades occupations

Construction and building trades n.e.c.

Half of full-time construction and building trades n.e.c. in the UK earn more than £34,822 a year, and half earn less.

Job holders in this unit group undertake a variety of tasks in the construction, alteration, maintenance and repair of buildings, steeples, industrial chimneys and other tall structures, and of underwater structures not elsewhere classified in minor group 531: Construction and building trades.

How people enter it

There are no formal academic entry requirements, though GCSEs/S grades are advantageous. Entry is typically through an approved apprenticeship programme or college course in conjunction with on-the-job training, leading to a NVQ/SVQ level 2/3 qualification, or through building up work experience supplemented with short courses.

What the work involves

• selects, measures and cuts steel bars, rods and wire to required lengths, positions and fixes reinforcements into position and tensions as required using hydraulic jacks
• lays bricks, tiles and building blocks to construct, repair and decorate buildings
• pours and levels concrete, prepares surfaces for painting and plastering, and mixes and applies plaster and paint
• installs plumbing fixtures, woodwork structures and fittings, and sets glass in frames
• maintains and repairs steeples, industrial chimneys and other high structures, and installs and replaces lightning conductors
• erects and repairs fencing
• checks and puts on diving suit and equipment and descends underwater to carry out construction, maintenance and repair tasks on sites such as oil rigs, harbours, bridges etc

Also called

Builder · Building contractor · Fencer · Fireplace fitter · Maintenance manager (buildings and other structures) · Property developer (building construction)

What it pays

How pay has changed

Median gross annual pay for construction and building trades n.e.c., full-time employees, 2023 to 2025. Each point is that year's ASHE April snapshot as published — revisions are not backfilled into earlier years, and a year ONS withheld is a gap rather than a joined line.

ONS, ASHE Table 14 - occupation by four-digit SOC (national). Table

Year-on-year change

The change from each year to the next, in per cent, computed from the figures in the chart above — so the two cannot disagree.

ONS, ASHE Table 14 - occupation by four-digit SOC (national). Table

Pay by region

Median gross annual pay for full-time employees, ranked, against the UK figure. 8 of 11 regions are published: ONS withholds a cell where the survey sample cannot support it, and those are shown as gaps rather than dropped — an absent region is not a region without the work in it.

ONS, ASHE Table 14 - occupation by four-digit SOC (national). Period 2025. Table

Every regional figure

ONS does not publish occupational pay below region. Cells the survey could not support are shown as withheld, with its reason — adding a region split to a specific occupation leaves roughly a tenth of cells publishable.

Common questions

Classified alongside this

Bricklayers · Carpenters and joiners · Glaziers, window fabricators and fitters · Plumbers and heating and ventilating installers and repairers · Roofers, roof tilers and slaters · Steel erectors · Stonemasons and related trades