One in three UK firms ‘expect to make redundancies’

One in three UK employers expect to make staff redundant between July and September, a survey suggests.

The research by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) and recruiter Adecco shows a 50% jump in the number of employers expecting to cut jobs compared to three months ago.

In the private sector, 38% of firms plan to make redundancies, compared to 16% in the public sector.

Firms with plans to hire rose – but numbers were down on past years.

‘Sombre autumn’

There have been an increasing number of job cuts as the coronavirus pandemic wiped more than a quarter off UK economic output.

In the month leading up to 9 July, more than 2,000 employers were asked whether they planned to make redundancies.

While 33% said they did expect to let staff go, another 49% said they planned to hire in the three months until the end of September.

That indicated an increase in confidence compared to the previous quarter when just 40% said they planned to take on new staff.

However, that figure was still “well below” levels seen in previous years, the report’s authors said. And the proportion of employers planning to hire, relative to those expecting to let go of staff, had fallen to its lowest level since 2013 when the survey began in its current form, they said.

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