During the first 3 months of the year UK unemployment fell by 36,000 according to the Office for National Statistics. After this fall the rate of unemployment now stands at 7.7% but among 16-20 year olds there are one in five young people now out of work. This roughly amounts to 935,000.

Gillian Econopouly, head of policy at the Recruitment & Employment Confederation, says: “We cannot lose sight of the fact that the jobs market remains volatile.

Recent reports by REC shows that while hiring activity in certain sectors is steadily increasing, there is still concern over the effects of public sector cuts and the creation of a two speed jobs market. However, employer confidence is on the rise and there is a sense of optimism surrounding the current landscape of employment. Whether the younger end of the spectrum will benefit from any new found confidence from employers remains to be seen.

Nigel Meager, director of the Institute for Employment Studies has stated that: “The latest official employment figures provide further confirmation that the recovery in the UK labour market is faltering and somewhat anaemic. The worse news is that big public sector job cuts will shortly pull out the bath plug, and overall employment levels may well fall again.” Meager has also stated that he believes that the UK is faring worse under the recession than many other countries. By early 2011 UK unemployment had fallen only 2%. This is in stark contrast to countries like Italy and Germany who saw a fall of 4% and 18% respectively.