UK employment growth slowed in March as COVID began to hit: ONS

(C) Reuters. FILE PHOTO: Commuters walk through Canary Wharf in London

LONDON (Reuters) – The number of people in work in Britain grew more slowly last month than in February, official figures showed on Tuesday in one of the first signs of the impact of the coronavirus shutdown on jobs.

Growth in the number of people on British companies’ payrolls slowed to 0.8% in March from 1.1% in February, according to preliminary tax data that has been released earlier than usual to give a clearer sense of the impact of COVID-19.

“These experimental statistics show a softening picture in March, but cover the month as a whole including the period before the coronavirus restrictions were in place,” David Freeman, an official at the Office for National Statistics, said.

The ONS also reported a 12,100 monthly increase in the number of unemployment benefit claims for March, far below the median forecast of 172,500 in a Reuters poll of economists.

The claims data is based on the situation on March 12, before much of the economy was shut down on March 23.