The latest KPMG and REC, UK Report on Jobs: North of England survey showed diverging hiring trends across the region as a faster drop in permanent placements compared with a sustained upturn in temporary billings. Overall, permanent staff appointments fell at the quickest rate since July 2020.
Amid reports of redundancies, recruiters noted an improvement in candidate availability in April. Nonetheless, wage pressures remained elevated, with starting pay across the North of England rising at faster rates than those seen in any other monitored English region.
The KPMG and REC, UK Report on Jobs: North of England is compiled by S&P Global from responses to questionnaires sent to around 150 recruitment and employment consultancies in the North of England.
The number of people placed into permanent roles across the North of England fell once again during April. The decrease accelerated markedly since March and was the strongest since July 2020. According to surveyed recruiters, client demand for staff had waned.
All four monitored English regions saw a drop in permanent placements, with the decline across the North of England outpaced only by that seen in London.
The seasonally adjusted Temporary Billings Index remained above the 50.0 no-change threshold in April, signalling a sustained uptick in billings received from the employment of short-term staff across the North of England. The increase was solid and stronger than seen for the UK as a whole, but eased slightly since March.
Some clients showed a preference for temps over permanent staff, according to anecdotal evidence.
The North of England continued to record the strongest rise in both types of job vacancies across the monitored English regions in April.
However, there was another slowdown in the rate of permanent job vacancy growth in the North of England during April, continuing the trend which started in the previous survey period. In fact, the increase in permanent job openings was the slowest since February 2021.
On the other hand, demand for temporary staff rose at a faster pace.
There was another boost to the availability of candidates for permanent positions across the North of England in April, the second successive improvement following a two-year period of shrinking supply. According to recruitment agencies, easing demand and redundancies lifted candidate numbers.
The increase was modest and broadly in line with that seen for the UK as whole, but slowed since March.
The latest survey data pointed to a further strong improvement in the supply of temporary candidates across the North of England. Redundancies were linked to the latest uptick.
Although the increase eased slightly, it was strong overall and considerably quicker than seen for the UK overall. In fact, London was the only other region to see an improvement, albeit one that was mild overall.
Although the seasonally adjusted Permanent Salaries Index dipped slightly in April, it held close to March’s six-month high and was indicative of a further steep rise in salaries awarded to new permanent joiners across the North of England. Moreover, the rate of inflation outpaced that seen across the other three monitored English regions in April.
Competitive pressures and efforts to attract the right candidates were mentioned by recruiters as reasons for higher pay offers.
April survey data signalled a further increase in temporary wages across the North of England, extending the current sequence of rising pay for short-term workers that began almost two-and-a-half years ago. The increase in the North of England also outpaced those seen in the other three monitored English regions by a notable margin.
Warren Middleton, Office Senior Partner at KPMG in Manchester, said:
“Jobseekers looking for temporary work are helping to plug some gaps in the North’s workforce and offer the region’s businesses a level of flexibility in the current climate of cooled demand and ongoing inflationary pressures.
“Firms will be hoping that cautious optimism in the economy will in time see the number of permanent candidates, who have been in shorter supply, increase. Across both types of vacancies, demand continues to outpace candidate supply, which is creating challenges for businesses seeking to make hay and capitalise on new opportunities to grow.”
Neil Carberry, Chief Executive of the REC, said:
“This data shows how uncertain many employers are feeling right now. The good news is they still need to hire, as growing vacancies show. The North of England continued to record the strongest rise in both permanent and temporary job vacancies across the monitored English regions in April. This shows firms are hedging their bets.
“Across the UK, REC members report weaker demand in some sectors than others as areas like logistics, driving and food are heavily affected by changing consumer behaviour. Taken together, however, there is still plenty of opportunity out there for jobseekers. Wages are rising strongly for both temps and new permanent hires in the North of England in the face of inflation, even though candidate availability is finally starting to improve.
“For employers, hiring is unlikely to get easier soon. Those businesses that succeed will have good, long-term strategies for accessing talent from a wide range of sources, including retraining. Recruiters are well-placed to help with this. Nowhere is the need for a strong hiring strategy more obvious than in our largest employer, the NHS, where the failure to partner properly with NHS staffing suppliers is lengthening waiting times and costing the public purse more than necessary. Reforming NHS frameworks in partnership with the industry would be in the interests of patients, medical staff and the taxpayer.”
