New ONS figures show lowest unemployment in over a decade

The latest figures released by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) this week revealed that unemployment is down by over 100,000 people with the rate running at 4.8%.

There continues to be 31.8 million people in work, up by 2.7 million since 2010. Long-term unemployment has fallen to 418,000 and is the lowest it has been since 2008, down 31,000 on the quarter. Meanwhile, youth unemployment stands at 587,000, a fall of 350,000 since 2010.

The number of women in work is at a record high of almost 15 million and long-term unemployment is down by 31,000 since July.

Commenting on the figures, the Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC) Chief Executive Kevin Green said: “Despite slowing growth in employment, the jobs market is ending the year in a strong position. Unemployment remains at its lowest level since 2005.

“There are reasons for optimism as we head into 2017. REC data shows demand for staff is increasing in many sectors. A quarter of employers plan to take on more permanent staff in the next three months. With inflation jumping to a two-year high last month, it’s encouraging to see pay is growing at a faster rate. This is likely to be the result of employers responding to candidate shortages, with fierce competition between employers for the talent available.

“While this is good news for workers, employers in many sectors will be unable to sustain pay rises as a reaction to ongoing skills shortages. The UK is at near full employment and employers are worried about the potential impact of changes to immigration policy curtailing access to the people they need from abroad to fill vacancies.”

John Salt, Group Sales Director, totaljobs: “It’s great to see that as we catapult towards the end of 2016, the job market continues to go from strength to strength. The confidence of businesses to keep on hiring has certainly been echoed in our recent Totaljobs Employment Index, which found that jobs posted on the totaljobs website were up 15% year-on-year in November, while applications soared 31%.”

Lee Biggins, Founder and Managing Director of CV-Library: “It’s good to see that the UK’s unemployment rate is down, at its lowest rate for over ten years. That said, it’s obvious that labour market activity has slowed down in recent months, as employment is slightly down on the previous quarter. Our own data for September found that vacancies grew by 9.8% during this time, suggesting that businesses are continuing to invest in their workforce and are determined to keep to economy moving by taking on more talent.”