London
The number of people in work in Britain fell by the most since 2009 in the three months through June as the coronavirus crisis took a heavy toll on the labor market, even with the government’s huge jobs protection scheme still in place. Led by a record plunge in self-employed workers, there were 220,000 less people employed in the second quarter, the Office for National Statistics said. Separate tax data for July showed that the number of staff on company payrolls had fallen by 730,000 since March, sounding the alarm about a potentially much bigger rise in joblessness. Mounting job losses are expected as Britain winds down its job retention scheme which protects employees. It is due to close at the end of October. “The cracks evident in the latest batch of labor market data are likely to soon turn into a chasm,” said Ruth Gregory, senior economist at Capital Economics. British finance minister Rishi Sunak said the figures showed the government’s support programs were working but job losses were inevitable. “I’ve always been clear that we can’t protect every job, but … we have a clear plan to protect, support and create jobs to ensure that nobody is left without hope,” he said.
