One hour-plus commutes have risen by third in seven years

THE number of people taking more than an hour to get to work every day has increased by nearly a third in less than a decade, figures have shown.

As a result, nearly one in 10 commuters now lives in a different region of the UK to where they work, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

More than 1.4 million take more than an hour to get to work, up from 1.08 million in 2011, figures have shown.

London has the biggest proportion of one hour-plus commutes, at 18 per cent. In Scotland, it is 4.5 per cent and in the North West 4.3 per cent.

Meanwhile, the number of women making long commutes into the capital has nearly doubled since 2011.

This is in part explained by such commutes becoming more prevalent in sectors such as education, health and social care, where high numbers of women work, the ONS said.

Nye Cominetti, a policy analyst at the Resolution Foundation, a think tank aiming to improve the standard of living of low and middle-income families, said: “The ever-lengthening time spent between home and work can be problematic for many reasons, especially so for those with caring responsibilities.

“Longer commutes are normally a trade-off for higher wages. But young people today are commuting for longer than previous generations did and aren’t getting bigger pay packets in return.

“This suggests that other factors, such as high housing costs, are forcing people to live ever further from work.”