Unemployment and claimants continue to fall in the West Midlands

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said there is "still no sign" that the closing of the furlough support scheme in September has affected the jobs market, with the number of UK workers on payrolls rising by 0.9 per cent between October and November to 29.4 million.

The unemployment rate fell once more, to 4.2 per cent in the three months to October, which is the lowest rate since spring 2020.

Meanwhile, the number of people out of work in the West Midlands also continues to fall.

The latest unemployment rate was 4.8 per cent with 140,000 out of work, down 1,000 from the previous three months.

The West Midlands also saw a drop in the numbers claiming unemployment benefits, including Universal Credit last month.

The total was down 7,280 to 207,985 – 5.7 per cent of the working population.

Wolverhampton had the highest rate of claimants at 8.4 per cent and was down by 475 to 13,805.

Walsall saw a drop of 365 to 11,835, Sandwell was down 465 to 15,575, while Dudley claimants fell by 465 to 11,040.

Staffordshire saw a drop of 795 to 17,765, or 3.3 per cent of the working population. Cannock Chase was down 115 to 2,395, Lichfield had 90 fewer claimants at 1,890 and Stafford dropped by 55 to 2,445. South Staffordshire's total fell by 85 to 2,185.

Wyre Forest, including Kidderminster, saw 130 fewer people claiming at 2,340.

Bally Pahal, senior partnership manager for Black Country district at Jobcentre Plus, said: "We are seeing a high volume of vacancies and we are working closely with our customers to prepare them for these opportunities.

"Across the Black Country we are offering sector-based work academy programmes to fill priority sector roles such as health and social care, civil service administration and logistics to support economic growth and raise career aspirations.

"Kickstart, the Government's flagship youth offer supporting young people 18 to 24 year olds into newly-created jobs, continues to support young people in Black Country.

"On a weekly basis we are welcoming local employers into our job centres to interview and offer jobs in a variety of sectors including administration, construction, healthcare, social media, retail and sales and many more with both small local employers and household names.’’

Nationally, vacancies also jumped to another new record – up 184,700 to 1.2 million between September and November, but there were signs of the recruitment crisis easing as the ONS reported the first month-on-month fall since February.

Vacancies dropped 80,000 between October and November while the quarterly growth rate also eased, the data showed.

But it comes amid fears over the impact on the economy of the highly infectious Omicron variant of coronavirus and new restrictions to control Covid-19.

Darren Morgan, ONS director of economic statistics, said: "With still no sign of the end of the furlough scheme hitting the number of jobs, the total of employees on payroll continued to grow strongly in November, although it could include people recently made redundant but still working out their notice.

"The number on payroll is now above pre-pandemic levels right across the country.

"Separately, survey findings show much of the recent growth in employment has been among part-timers, who were particularly hard hit at the start of the pandemic.

"While job vacancies continue at record levels, the number is not growing as fast as it did earlier this year."

Chancellor Rishi Sunak said: "The jobs outlook remains strong thanks to our £400 billion economic support package, Plan for Jobs and fantastic vaccine programme; the unemployment rate fell to 4.2 per cent, employee numbers grew at a record rate in November and redundancies are below pre-pandemic levels.

"To keep safeguarding our economic recovery and the lives and livelihoods of the British people, I am now calling on everyone to keep playing their part and Get Boosted Now."