Employers keep hiring on hold as jobs growth stalls, CIPD finds

The latest Labour Market Outlook from the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) showed employer confidence stayed close to record lows outside the pandemic and showed no signs of recovery since spring 2025.

The net employment balance held at +9, just above its lowest point outside the pandemic. 

Private sector employment intentions sat at +11, matching the joint low first reached in spring 2025 and have barely changed since then. 

Just 57% of private sector employers expected to recruit in the next three months, also a joint low outside the pandemic.

The CIPD said the Government should focus on cutting the cost of hiring and creating the right conditions for employers to invest and grow if it wants to boost job creation, especially for young people. 

The organisation called on the Government to make sure planned new rights for zero hours contract workers do not restrict opportunities for young people, restore the employer National Insurance threshold to £9,100 a year to help create part-time jobs, pause plans to align the minimum wage for 18 to 20-year-olds with the adult rate, and introduce an apprenticeship guarantee for all 16 to 24-year-olds.

James Cockett, senior labour market economist at the CIPD, said: “Our data suggests that the UK labour market has largely stopped moving. 

“Hiring has weakened, but redundancy levels haven’t risen, leaving us in a ‘low hire, low fire’ environment that’s increasingly looking like a ‘new normal’.