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experienced another very poor month with just £240m of projects receiving the green light. A monthly average of £400m was recorded in 2021 and Q1 2022. PLANNING APPLICATIONS e longer-term outlook indicated by the value of projects submitted for planning approval is looking relatively healthy, with £9.2bn of applications submitted. However, the picture is very mixed across the sectors. Infrastructure and healthcare have been the big winners in terms of planning applications. Battery storage, windfarm and solar energy projects took the level of Infrastructure planning applications lodged in April to £2.8bn. e redevelopment of a hospital in West Sussex is largely responsible for a great month for Healthcare planning applications at a value of £700m. e education sector recorded its best month for planning applications in 2022, with applications valued at £400m lodged in April. e commercial sector was broadly at with £700m of planning applications recorded, as the sector continued at slightly below average performance. Following several good months, the hotel and leisure sector returned to its weak underlying trend with just £300m of planning applications lodged in April. But the big faller in April was the residential sector with a 34% drop on March levels of planning applications. Although £3.3bn worth of applications were lodged, this is the weakest level since May 2020. Hall continued: “ ere is no doubt that concerns over the strength of UK economy and the wider geopolitical situation are having a depressive e ect on the construction industry, however, the outlook is not all negative. New construction activity is still happening, at broadly long-term average levels instead of the high levels seen over the second half of 2021 and the Q1 of 2022. Generally, activity has ipped back to infrastructure and public sector construction, with commercially sensitive sectors weaker, which is not unexpected.” R esearch by tax refund expert, RIFT Tax Refunds, reveals that construction subcontractors are earning £3,000 less a year than they were prior to the pandemic. While almost all industries in England ground to halt during the pandemic, construction workers kept going under increasingly di cult circumstances and stringent social distancing rules. Subcontractors played a central role in keeping the country moving forward and laying the foundations for the UK economy to make a strong post- pandemic recovery. Despite this, the research shows that their earnings have taken a signi cant hit since the pandemic began. In December 2019, just before the start of the pandemic, construction subcontractors in England were earning an average of £49,296 per year. Fast forward to today and the latest numbers show that average earnings have declined by -£2,860, or -5.8%, to an average of £46,436. Subcontractors have endured the biggest wage drop in the North East where earnings have declined by -£4,900 per year, or -12.2%, followed by the West Midlands (-11%), and the East of England (-5.7%). ere is, however, some good news. Owing to the nature of their work and the requirement to travel to multiple di erent sites within the same year, construction workers are amongst the most likely to be owed money by HMRC. In 2019, the average one-year refund was £1,894 while today it stands at £1,993, an increase of 5.2%. Tax refunds can also be backtracked for four years which means, if a subcontractor has not made a claim before, they can claim up to four years’ worth of refunds. e average payout for this is £7,972, having increased by £395 since before the pandemic. £3,000 DECLINE IN CONSTRUCTION EARNINGS, BUT TAX REFUNDS LIKELY Summer 2022 47