Aaron Morby | Fri 12th August | 13:36

Construction enjoyed its shortest-lived recovery today after Government strong growth figures were withdrawn four hours after being released.

Number crunchers at the Office of National Statistics admitted that construction output figures released on Friday morning were wrong, and a revised them down to 0.5% several hours later.

This morning the official Government output figures showed the industry had rebounded from a steep fall in output in the winter and spring with lively 2.3% growth in the second quarter.

In fact, last month’s initial estimate for sluggish construction growth of 0.5% in the second quarter of 2011, which was plugged into the nation’s GDP figures, proved to be an accurate forecast for actual construction output.

A spokesman said: ”The impact of the error is to overstate the published headline Q2/Q1 growth of 2.3%.”

He added: “ONS apologises for any inconvenience caused.”