Category: JOBS

Isabel Mills will qualify as a nurse in October after studying at City St George's, University of London for the past three years, but she has been unable to find a nursing job in the capital. Mills, from Welling in south-east London, has spent the past couple of months applying for jobs and said she was increasingly concerned by the lack of entry-level opportunities."If I search in London, a lot of the jobs are Band 8 which is for managers," she said. "There aren't many options unless you want to move out of London."NHS Vacancy statistics show that as of March 2026, the Registered Nursing staff group had a vacancy rate of 5%, with 21,643 vacancies.New nurses typically apply for entry-level Band 5 positions, but statistics show that the number of those jobs has been falling, particularly in London.A Freedom of Information request submitted by the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) to the NHS Business Services Authority found advertised Band...

The number of job vacancies in the UK is at the lowest level for five years. Roles fell to 707,000 between May and July, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS) data. That’s the fewest vacancies since April 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic. The decline was driven by smaller businesses pausing hiring or not replacing leaving staff due to employment and other operating costs. The largest fall in vacancies was at small businesses employing between one and nine workers. They cut 8,000 vacancies. Liz McKeown, ONS director of economic statistics, said: “The labour market picture is little changed overall, with some softening still evident. Employment, unemployment and inactivity rates have all remained steady, while the number of employees on payroll fell slightly in the latest quarter. “Vacancies remain broadly flat, though a small fall in the latest period puts them at the lowest level in more than five years. The latest decrease was driven mainly by smaller businesses, which cite labour and operating costs...

….vacancies fell by over 700,000 Job vacancies in the United Kingdom (UK) fell to a five-year low of 707,00, according to reports by the BBC. Vacancy numbers fell over the May-to-July period to 707,000, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), which said small businesses were citing labour and operating costs as reasons for scaling back hiring. This contraction in active job openings is caused by elevated operating costs in energy caused by the US-Iran war. These companies have also noted that increases in National Insurance and the minimum wage have made it more expensive to employ staff. Addressing youth unemployment remains a central policy focus, particularly after the number of 16- to 24-year-olds classified as not in education, employment, or training (NEET) topped one million earlier this year. In addition, wage growth slowed to 4.1 per cent in the three months to June, down from 4.4 per cent in the previous period.d This data underlines a growing economic headwind ahead of the autumn budget...

Before joining the company, he had little knowledge of what working in a fish market involved. “I had no idea how it was going to be as it’s nothing like I had thought of before,” he said. “But now, being in it for nine months, I can say it has been really fun and I have learnt a lot.” According to Tim Boyd, director of New Wave Seafood, Bush has developed a broad range of practical skills since joining the business. These include filleting fish, preparing seafood products, cooking lobster and crab, making fish cakes, preparing sides of salmon and producing taramasalata. He has also taken on customer-facing responsibilities, including handling telephone enquiries, taking orders and assisting with fish purchasing. “I never expected I would learn how to fillet a fish in my life, let alone cook it, and suddenly I can now do both,” Bush said. He also credited shop manager Adam Yeoh for helping him settle into the role and develop confidence...

Artificial intelligence has created new jobs in more than half of UK firms, according to a study by British bank Lloyds, even as fears about its impact on employment grow. The study does not, however, specify whether other roles have been eliminated at the same time. "More than half (54%) of UK businesses say AI has created new jobs," Lloyds said in a statement, based on its monthly business research. AI has raised concerns about the jobs market, with some fearing its impact on unemployment, particularly for young people. An OECD report last month found that AI is not causing widespread decline in employment across its member countries, but noted that the technology is changing the skills businesses are looking for and may make it harder for younger people to enter the workforce. Global youth unemployment rose last year, with young people expressing anxiety about entry-level jobs being replaced by technology, according to a United Nations report earlier this month. AI is increasingly providing flexible, fast...

Every year, tens of thousands of young Nigerians move to the UK in search of a better life. Edidiong* (25) came for a master’s degree after his family scraped together every naira they could find. A year after graduation, he’s still hustling for a job that will sponsor his work Visa. The pressure is real, and failure could mean losing everything. As told to Aisha Bello I arrived in the UK in August 2023 with a suitcase full of big dreams and a heart full of hope. I was ready to take on the world, or at least, that was the plan.  My family and our extended network back home had scraped together every naira they could spare to send me here for a master’s degree in International Business Management and Entrepreneurship. Everyone believed in me and expected me to succeed. I believed it, too. My first year in the new country passed in a blur of routine and cautious optimism. I worked as...

Brown Brothers Harriman’s (BBH) Elias Haddad describes United Kingdom (UK) June labor data as soft, with unemployment stuck at 4.9% and private sector regular pay growth slowing to 2.8% year-on-year. Haddad judges current market pricing of 60 bps of Bank of England (BoE) hikes over 12 months as too aggressive, yet believes the UK’s favorable growth-inflation mix still offers British Pound (GBP) support for now.Labor slack tempers BoE expectations"UK June jobs data was soft and indicative of ongoing labor market slack. The unemployment rate was unexpectedly unchanged at 4.9% for a third straight month in June. Consensus and the BoE had 4.8% penciled-in.""Moreover, the policy-relevant private sector regular pay growth slowed to 2.8% y/y in June (lowest since October 2020) vs. 2.9% in May. That matched consensus and the BoE’s projection.""The swaps curve continues to price-in 60bps of BoE rate hikes in the next twelve months. That’s too aggressive in our view given the UK’s negative output gap, and leaves...

(Aug 18): UK employers shed more workers in July and job vacancies hit a fresh five-year low as demand for staff remained tepid in the face of heightened uncertainty from events at home and abroad.The number of employees on company payrolls dropped 13,000 in July after a similar fall the previous month, data from the Office for National Statistics showed on Tuesday. Economists surveyed by Bloomberg had expected no change.Job vacancies dropped further to 707,000 in the May to July period, the lowest since 2021. Private sector wage growth, excluding bonuses, the gauge watched closely by the Bank of England for signs of inflationary pressures, eased to 2.8% in the second quarter, the lowest in almost six years.While some recent data have pointed to stabilisation in the jobs market, employers seem reluctant to hire amid heightened uncertainty over the Iran war and the first budget under new UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham later this year.The pound and market bets on...

Robert Jenrick says Britain has a welfare problem. He wants millions of people receiving sickness and disability benefits to move into work. But there is a fundamental problem with that argument: where are the jobs? UK unemployment is already around five per cent, youth unemployment is higher, vacancies have been falling, and there are substantially more unemployed people than available jobs. You cannot solve an employment shortage simply by increasing the number of people required to look for work. There is an even bigger contradiction. The Bank of England has been using high interest rates to suppress demand in the economy. Weaker demand means less investment, lower consumption and, ultimately, reduced demand for workers, as a result of deliberate government policy. At the same time, just when Reform UK wants to push more people into the labour market while cutting the incomes of those who cannot find work, those benefit cuts would themselves reduce spending and demand, potentially destroying still more jobs. None of this makes...

AI is helping East of England firms create new jobs and build the skills needed to stay competitive, according to research from the Lloyds Business Barometer.Businesses step up investment in AI skills62% of East of England businesses already using AI say it has created new jobs in their firm, while 51% of all firms in the region plan to increase investment in AI to upskill their workforce in the coming year.Of those increasing investment, 47% expect to spend between £25,000 and £100,000, while 40% expect to spend between £100,000 and £250,000.While 52% of East of England businesses say their workforce has the AI skills needed, 40% say it does not.Overall, 71% of the region’s firms say they currently use AI.AI becoming essential for competitiveness54% of East of England firms say that businesses which fail to adopt AI in the next three years will be at a competitive disadvantage, suggesting AI is increasingly viewed as a competitive necessity.Barriers to AI adoptionBusinesses...