More pushed into part time work as firms cut hours

29th July 2009

Simon Harding

Almost a million people in the UK have been forced to take part-time jobs due to a lack of full-time employment, according to data published by the Office for National Statistics. With the recession hitting firms hard, increasing numbers of workers are being asked to work less hours. May 2009 saw 927,000 people unwillingly working reduced hours because they could not find full-time work or had their hours cut by their employers, the highest figure since the ONS began collecting the data in 1992.

Part-time work and reduced hours hide the true impact of the recession, claims the TUC. ‘These people won’t be showing up in the spiralling unemployment figures but the economic slowdown and their subsequent move into part-time work will have forced many of these families to rein in their spending dramatically’, said TUC general secretary Brendan Barber. The effects of the recession on the British economy could be worse than the rapidly rising unemployment rate, currently standing at 7.6%, suggests. Reduced household spending will have a knock on effect on the shops and small businesses on local high streets across the country.

However, whilst reduced hours, decreased monthly earnings and the subsequent drop in consumer spending contribute to the current pessimism, the ability to cut staff hours can be an important strategy for small businesses feeling the economic pinch. Cutting back staff working hours makes sense because it allows small businesses to keep their work forces together, whilst reducing the wage bill. This allows the business to increase hours once the recovery period begins and business picks up, avoiding the costs of recruiting and training new staff.

Whilst these latest ONS statistics will be presented as yet another sign of Britain’s economic slump, they may also reflect an important survival tactic for small enterprises, which will help drive the UK’s economic recovery in the coming year.


See also: ‘More forced into part time work’, BBC News, 27/7/09. Available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8159269.stm