Skill set in short supply

Waikato companies are struggling to find skilled workers as the region’s employment demand carries through the year.

There has been considerable job growth in 2017 and Waikato has the lowest unemployment in the North Island.

Waikato was the only region to have a significant increase in employment in the March 2017 quarter, with 9500 more people in work, Statistics New Zealand figures show.

Construction industry jobs accounted for over a third of these workers, with 3600 workers employed.

Job listings in Waikato increased 36.5 per cent in the year to March 2017, according to Trade Me job market numbers.

And Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment analysis shows online job vacancies have continued a steady increase in the months since.

Ullrich Aluminium extrusion mill manager Stewart Wright said there was a sizeable labour pool to draw from when hiring temporary workers.

‘‘What we find is, there’s plenty of unskilled people around, but finding reliable ones is extremely difficult.’’

Temporary workers would often struggle to show up on Mondays and Fridays, and at times failed mandatory drug tests, Wright said.

One of six similar operations around the country, Ullrich employs about 60 people on a five hectare site in Pukete.

‘‘A lot of the labourers that come in have moved from places like the East Coast that haven’t been doing so well.’’

Waikato has the lowest unemployment rate in the North Island and matches the national average, at 4.9 per cent.

This was down 0.6 per cent from the previous March.

Skilled workers, such as a recent migrant who moved from Auckland for a specialised CAD drawing job, are harder to find.

‘‘Soon as you start to get into those areas, you really struggle. That’s where a change in immigration would really hurt us.’’

Gallagher people and brand executive Helen Camilleri said expanding overseas business has driven their recruitment.

‘‘In the last three to six months there’s been a definite uplift in production.

‘‘Our recruitment has been very high in our operations area.’’

Employing software engineers was an ongoing challenge, with large technology companies in the big cities attracting and capturing that skill set.

‘‘We try to work with the local tech organisations to make sure it is attractive to these software engineers, not long graduated, to actually give companies like ourselves a try, outside the bigger city.’’

Allied Workforce recruiter Iaana Tawha said the standards of some employers had dropped.

‘‘They need people with specific skills and if we advertise it we’re not getting those bites we used to.

‘‘But then, saying that, some of our clients are willing to train up.’’

In some instances, low wages failed to attract the right candidates for a job.

‘‘If it’s a matter of forklift driver, some of them are being paid minimum wage.

‘‘You don’t want to be paying them $15.75, that’s going to attract no-one.’’

Alignz Recruitment manager Mandeep Singh said there was plenty of work, both skilled and unskilled, but finding the right skilled workers was difficult.

‘‘We are really struggling, we are having to advertise double than in the past.’’