Member Article

Sharp growth in permanent job appointments across North

Recruitment consultants across the North of England say growth of permanent job appointments was sharp in September, and temporary placements also rose for the fourteenth month running.

The growth rate for permanent staff demand across the North rose to the highest since July 1998.

Demand for temp workers rose at a slightly slower pace in September, but was still the second-fastest in over nine years. The rates of expansion both surpassed those seen at the UK level.

Permanent candidate numbers in the North fell for the eighth consecutive month in September. The overall rate of contraction was solid, but eased slightly since August.

The latest data indicated that permanent candidate supply also fell in the remaining English regions, with the sharpest decline seen in London. At the national level, the availability of permanent workers contracted at a solid pace.

Mick Thompson, KPMG’s Newcastle office senior partner, said: “With the Bank of England arguing last week that economic recovery will only be sustainable over the long term if regions beyond London grow strongly, it is heartening to see the North showing yet more sharp growth in the number of permanent placements.

“Improving market conditions, higher activity levels amongst clients and generally stronger levels of confidence amongst employers are certainly some of the major factors underpinning this latest rise.

“Yet it remains worrying that employees are clearly still not sharing employers’ growing faith in recovery. Demand for staff may be up, but the number of individuals putting themselves on the market has dropped for the eighth consecutive month. Perhaps pay has to rise to encourage staff to ‘make the move’. If it doesn’t, we could be about to witness a growing gap between what employers need and what employees are prepared to do.”

REC chief executive Kevin Green says: “This month’s figures show the jobs market continues to be the success story in the UK economy with all regions and sectors experiencing growth. Recruiters tell us that the number of people being placed into permanent roles has now been growing and temp growth maintains its strength.

“This is good news but behind this success story we can see that the division in the jobs market is getting worse with vacancies going up as the number of skilled workers to fill them goes down. There is a real two speed labour market in place. We have a buoyant, candidate driven market for skilled and professional roles, versus an oversupply of candidates for jobs that don’t rely on a specific skill set.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Tom Keighley .