The People Bulletin

The ONS employment figures released on 12 August 2009 indicate that the number of unemployed people, the unemployment rate and the claimant count have all risen.  The employment rate and the number of employed people have all fallen and there are fewer vacancies.  The bonus factor has distorted the earnings picture – earnings growth fell when bonuses were stripped out, but rose when they were included. 

A full summary can be viewed at: 

www.statistics.gov.uk/pdfdir/lmsuk0809.pdf 

However, a CIPD/KPMG Labour Market Outlook survey – involving more than 900 employers and covering all sectors of the economy published on 10 August suggested that private sector employment is stabilising following a surge of redundancies earlier ht in the year.  Not only are far fewer employers expecting to make staff redundant but the scale of planned redundancies has also reduced.  However this is offset by mounting pessimism in the public sector. 

John Philpott, the CIPD’s chief economist predicted that unemployment was likely to top 3 million in 2010 and that ‘another avalanche’ of private sector redundancies could not be ruled out.  KPMG’s chief economist, Andrew Smith remarked on the how number of organisations planning to defer or cancel pay reviews indicates that there is a lack of conviction among employers that ‘current economic green shoots will lead to sustainable healthy growth in the future’.

A copy of the research is available from the CIPD 

www.cipd.co.uk