Delivery Of Jobs For The Transport Sector

Manpower employment outlook survey reveals that it’s steady as she goes for the transport sector

–     Sector delivers an Employment Outlook of +2%

–     Increase in demand for all types of drivers as businesses look ahead to the peak period

–     Companies gearing up for busiest Christmas in years

10 September 2013: The Transport Sector continues to deliver positive hiring intentions as businesses across the country look to gear up for the peak season, according to ManpowerGroup, the world leader in innovative workforce solutions. This quarter’s Employment Outlook of +2% shows a marginal decline on the Q3 Outlook of +3%, but demonstrates that it really is steady as she goes for the sector as companies begin to think about resourcing for Christmas.

The Manpower Employment Outlook Survey is based on responses from 2,104 UK employers. It asks whether employers intend to hire additional workers or reduce the size of their workforce in the coming economic quarter. It is the most comprehensive, forward-looking employment survey of its kind and is used as a key economic statistic by both the Bank of England and the UK government. The National Seasonally Adjusted Net Employment Outlook of +6%[1] indicates sustained optimism in the UK jobs market, building on the third quarter of 2013 when the Outlook was +5% and ensuring that 2013 finishes with the strongest fourth quarter since before the financial crisis.

“We are seeing a particularly strong demand in the coming quarter for all types of drivers but especially for Class 1 and Class 2 drivers,” says Simon Edwards, ManpowerGroup Sector Director – Logistics. “In support of a recovering construction sector, more and more of our customers are looking for Class 2 Lorryloaders, as builders and respective industries pick up.  Seperately, industries such as the postal market, courier firms and retailers are looking for Cat B and 7.5T drivers as the boom in home delivery continues.

“This year, we are noticing that several key clients are looking to take on staff much earlier in anticipation of peak demand, with some wanting staff in place as early as October. This is a marked difference even to last year, when companies were leaving it much later to take on staff  – sometimes only a week or two before they were needed. This is for a number of reasons, there is a general feeling in the market that it is becoming increasingly difficult to find good, quality and reliable drivers for the home delivery networks and as this Christmas has all the hallmarks of being the busiest for online shopping, companies do not not want to lose out on securing the best staff to cope with the additional demand.”

The jobs market has suddenly become the hottest economic indicator in town thanks to the forward guidance issued by Mark Carney, the new Governor of the Bank of England and 2013 has been a game changing year for the UK jobs market in a number of other key sectors.

Finance and Business Services employers are out and out showing the most confident signs of hiring, reporting an Outlook of +16%, although a lot of the new jobs being created in the sector are as a result of the need to fix past mistakes and deal with the impact of scandals, such as PPI mis-selling. 2013 has also been a transformative year for the High Street and our survey shows the Retail sector forecast is up at +3% this quarter, with employers in the Retail sector reporting their most optimistic year since 2007.