Business Survey Estimates Fall In Number Of Jobs

The Business Register and Employment Survey estimates that for September 2010 there were 26.8m employees, down 134,000 on 2009. Tha largest fall among the countries of the UK was in Scotland at 73,000.

The region with the most employees was London with 4.1m (15.3% of UK employees) next came the South East with 3.7m (13.8%). London also had the highest proportion of full-time employees at 74.1%. Other regions had less than 70%. The regions with the lowest number of employees were Northern Ireland with 705,000 (2.6%) and the North East with 999,000 (3.7%) with over a third part-time.

In the UK as a whole, there were 18.1m full-time and 8.7m part-time employees. The health sector continued to have the largest number of employees with 3.6m. The industry with the lowest number of employees was agriculture, forestry and fishing with 214,000 (0.8%). Construction employment decreased the most down 118,000 employees. Mining, quarrying and utilities had the largest proportion of full-time workers at 93.3%. The retail sector had the largest proportion of part-time workers at 57.2%. Business administration and support services grew by 62,000.

GDP Falls Over The Quarter, Record Fall Over The Year

The final estimated UK GDP in volume terms increased by 0.3% on the previous quarter, the same as it was estimated in the previous estimate in May. GDP fell in volume by a record 4.9% during 2009. The household saving ratio was 6.9% and real household disposable income rose by 0.4% following a fall of 1% in the previous quarter.

GDP output by category shows that in agriculture, forestry and fisheries output fell by 2.2%. The production industries increased output by 1% over the quarter but output fell by 10.2% over 2009. Mining and quarrying output fell by 0.5% but manufacturing output rose by 1.4%. Electricity, gas and water utilities output increased by 0.4% but construction decreased by 1.6%. Services increased output by 0.3% but output in 2009 fell by 3.3% on 2008 while distribution, hotels and restaurants fell in all sub-categories and by 0.7% overall. Transport, storage and communication increased output by 0.2% due to weaker growth in land transport and post and telecommunications. Business services and finance output increased by 1% due to stronger growth in banking, renting and real estate. Government and other services reported an unchanged level of growth with output in health and social care increasing by 0.5% and other services increasing by 0.2%. Education decreased by 0.6% and public administration and defence output fell by 0.3%.

GDP can also be analysed using expenditure categories. Gross domestic expenditure incrrased by 1.2%. Household final consumption expenditure fell by 0.1% and so the volume of spending in 0.2% lower than Q1 2009. Government final consumption expenditure increased by 1.5% from 0.1% in the previous quarter. Gross fixed capital formation increased by 4.4% compared with a fall of 1.7% in the previous quarter. The increase was mainly due to an increase of 7.8% in business investment which is still 7.7% lower than Q1 2009. General government investment increased by 6.5%. In 2009 gross fixed capital formation decreased by 15% compared with 5% a year earlier. Inventories decreased by £2.2bn. The trade deficit increased to £10.4bn.

The GDP implied deflator at market prices was 2.9% above the same quarter 2009 and increased by 1.7% over the quarter 2010. GDP at market prices increased by 2.1% over the quarter but fell by 3.7% in 2009.

Production Index Down This Quarter

Production was down to 1.8% to 87.0 compared with the previous three months and down 12.3% on the year. Manufacturing output decreased by 1.2% , mining and quarrying by 2.7% and electricity, gas and water supply industries by 5.5% on the previous quarter according to the Office for National Statistics. The most significant falls in manufacturing were in basic metals and metal products, machinery and equipment and transport equipment industries. There were rises in food and drink and chemicals. Consumer durables and consumer non-durables were up, durables by 1.2% and non-durables by 1.7% on the last three months, both still down on a year ago. Over the last month durables increased output by 6.6% non-durables decreased by 0.9%. Both capital goods and intermediate goods and energy fell on the month, the quarter and the year. The production index has continued on a downward trend, with some fluctuations, since March 2008 when figures were new or started to be revised by the ONS.

Chemicals And Consumer Non-Durables Up

Production output decreased by 3.2% in 3 months to April and was 12.6% down on last year. Manufacturing was also down 2.8% and the mining and quarrying industries by 4.0% on the quarter and 9.3% on the year. The most significant rises in the manufacturing industry were 3.2% in the transport equipment industries, 2.3% in chemicals and 1.6% in paper, printing and publishing. The utilities were down 5.5%. It was similar for basic metals and metal products at 2.2%.

In the three main market sectors, output of consumer durable goods fell by 4.7%, non-durables were 1.9% up on the quarter and 0.8% up on the month. Capital goods were 5.6% down on the last quarter but 0.8% up on the month. Output of intermediate goods and energy were also lower. Food, drink and tobacco were up on the last quarter with a 1.6% increase.

The ONS's Index of Production is an important short-term indicator of industrial activity. It is a monthly time series covering 18.0% of the UK economy.