REC’s Annual Industry Report 2005/06

The findings from the Recruitment and Employment Confederation’s (REC) Annual Industry Turnover and Key Volumes Survey 2005/06 have been released today.

The key findings include:

• A record total industry turnover of £24.838 billion compared to £24.249 billion in 2004/05. The 5.8 per cent growth it represents is the highest rate since 2000/2001.
  • Overall turnover for temporary/contract staff rose by 6.4 per cent to £21.6 billion
  • Total turnover for permanent staff went up 2 per cent to £3.275 billion compared to £3.211 billion the previous year while at the same time, overall share of the market dropped by 0.5 per cent to 13.2 per cent
• Permanent placements increased by 7.9 per cent from 654,203 in 2004/2005 to 706,080. Most permanent placements were in secretarial and clerical, accounting for 30 per cent of the market - twice as many as those placed in computing and IT, which totalled 15 per cent.
• Temporary placements went up by 3.8 per cent from 1,218,813 to 1,265,060
• Staff employed in the recruitment industry decreased by 1.6 per cent from 99,188 to 97,674. Much of this was due to the reduction in non-sales roles such as administration and management.

If you want a full copy of the Report (13 pages of graphs and figures plus executive summary and comment) you will be able to purchase one from the REC website. However, when I checked this morning the online ordering system wasn’t quite up to date – with the most recent report being that for 2004/05!