1 in 3 firms ready to lay off employees

ALMOST a third of firms are preparing to lay off staff, according to a devastating report.

The threat of mass lay-offs comes ahead of figures which are today expected to show the biggest fall in employment since the 1980s.

More than one million firms are claiming taxpayer support through the Job Retention Scheme, which is paying the wages of 9.4million workers. But a poll of 7,400 firms by the British Chambers of Commerce found that almost three in ten expect to decrease their workforce before the furlough scheme ends in October.

A similar proportion (28 per cent) have already laid off staff since the lockdown began.

Job prospects are bleaker at firms with ten or more staff, as more than four in ten expect to make redundancies in the next three months. Yesterday Boris Johnson said at Prime Minister’s Questions he cannot wave a ‘magic wand’ to save millions of jobs under threat from coronavirus.

Capital Economics said it expects today’s report by the Office for National Statistics will show around 210,000 people lost their jobs in May, the biggest spike since the recession in the mid-1980s.