The gloomy economic outlook is leading to businesses hiring fewer employees as tightness in labour markets begins to unwind.
Permanent staff appointments in July declined at the fastest pace in more than three years “as concerns over the outlook made clients hesitant to commit to new staff”, according to the latest UK jobs report by KPMG, the professional services firm, and the Recruitment & Employment Confederation.
Growth in billings for temporary workers slowed to a “fractional pace”, the slowest since October, the report, based on S&P Global data, found.
Staff availability rose steeply as a result of the slowdown in recruitment and amid reports of redundancies. The survey data found the steepest upturn in total labour supply, excluding the pandemic period, since October 2009.
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