Employment | UK job applications rose by 32% in June

As the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS) – which was created by the UK Government and announced by Chancellor Rishi Sunak earlier this year to stave off mass redundancies due to the pandemic – shifts and winds down its central operations, many major employers such as Rolls-Royce, British Airways, OVO Energy and Travis Perkins have announced that job cuts have become a necessity.

As a result, the recruitment market, which was until recently heavily candidate-led, has transformed. In fact, the latest data from jobs board CV-Library has revealed that competition for current roles has intensified to the point at which applications are up across the board by an average of 32%.

The spike was most keenly felt in June when roles saw interest jump by over one quarter – there were a reported 106% more applicants battling for jobs than in the same period in 2019. And whilst the rise in applicants was felt across the whole recruitment market, several cities within the UK experienced even higher demand. These were: