Birmingham bucks UK trend as retail jobs slide 12% since EU referendum
Retail job vacancies have fallen by 12% in Birmingham in the year since the EU referendum, a new report has concluded.
The study, completed by online recruiter Fish4jobs, concluded that the sector was one of the more vulnerable to EU uncertainty as many shopworkers were drawn from the EU.
Fish4jobs said companies currently could not guarantee that the Brexit negotiations would enable them to retain EU nationals working in Britain, especially in sectors with transient employees, such as retail.
The Office of National Statistics (ONS) released a report in April this year highlighting that an estimated 508,000 employees working in the UK’s retail, wholesale and restaurants are from the 27 other EU nations.
The precarious position of the retail sector is illustrated by the large number of empty shops at centres not just in Birmingham, but throughout the West Midlands.
Even showpiece centres such as Birmingham’s Grand Central sstill has a large numer of empty units, more than 18 months after its original opening.
More established venues, such as the Merry Hill Shopping Centre, also have vacant units.
Fish4jobs said the shrinking retail job market in Birmingham was even more alarming when compared to the rest of the UK. Figures show that the retail job market has increased by 0.69% year on year across the UK as a whole.
Gary Fenn, Insight Analyst at Fish4jobs, said: “We are now one year on from the Brexit referendum, and it’s intriguing to see the effect it has had on the job market across the UK. There has been a lot of uncertainty for businesses and employees which has clearly impacted the retail job market differently across the UK.”
UK retail sales fell by 0.4% in May as consumers tightened their purse strings as the uncertainty in the economy increased.
In Q1, the UK was reported as having the slowest economic growth out of all the G7 countries, which suggests future growth for the retail job market is clouded with uncertainty.
This latest job market data is sourced from Job Market Insights – which has an 85% representation of the UK job market.
