Job vacancies in the UK have fallen by 42 per cent, according to Adzuna.co.uk

The research by Adzuna.co.uk found that job vacancies in the UK have fallen by 42 per cent in the year to date.

The pandemic continues to disrupt the UK jobs market, with hospitality, energy, and administration vacancies falling to their lowest levels in more than eight years.

The US is the second biggest casualty in the job market with a 38 per cent reduction in advertised vacancies, followed by Russia (-32 per cent), which implemented additional measures to slow the spread of the virus on Monday.

New Zealand is also among the worst affected markets (-27 per cent), as a strict lockdown continues across the country.

Andrew Hunter, co-founder of Adzuna, said; “The economy has been hugely impacted by the measures to control the spread of the virus in recent weeks.

“The UK has lost a staggering 42 per cent of vacancies over an eight-week period. This is another blow for the UK, which is predicted to see unemployment soar by more than two million and the economy shrink by 35 per cent according to the Office for Budget Responsibility.

“We are continuing to see vacancies in the hospitality industry decline and it’s no surprise, with the lockdown measures set to still be in place for the foreseeable future, that this figure will continue to decrease.

“The UK reduction in hospitality vacancies is significantly higher than we are seeing in neighbouring countries. This is reflective of the different phases of the pandemic each country is in at this time and we anticipate other countries will see a similar impact”.

Mr Hunter added: “Although the vacancy figures are on a steady decline, we are confident that the UK job market will bounce back from this once we have passed the peak of the pandemic, but we can expect to see this downward trend continue over the next few weeks.”

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