...as surge in job numbers sends records tumbling

BRITAIN’S job-creating economy broke a string of records in 2017, official figures reveal.

At least ten records were set over the course of the year, defying claims that the EU referendum result would mean a jobs bloodbath.

They included the employment rate, which hit a 40-year high in the spring, new highs for older people, women and ethnic minorities in work, and record lows for unemployment, young people not in work or studying and redundancies.

The figures are a fresh humiliation for the architects of Project Fear. In May last year, the Treasury warned that a Leave vote would cause an ‘immediate and profound’ economic shock, and plunge the country into recession. Instead, the UK has continued to defy the doomsayers.

Last night employment minister Damian Hinds hailed the impact of reforms, including the Government’s flagship Universal Credit programme, and said tax cuts and minimum wage hikes meant workers were keeping more of their money.

Department for Work and Pensions figures show the employment rate – the percentage of people in work – peaked at 75.3 per cent in the three months from May to July. That is the highest since records began in the early 1970s.

The number of people in work is also at a new high of 32.14 million people, and unemployment hit its lowest rate since 1975 at 4.3 per cent. The total is down over a million since 2010.

Mr Hinds said: ‘I’m delighted that more people from all areas of life are reaping the rewards that employment brings, and I want to build on that success next year.’