One-in-three jobs in parts of Britain at risk due to Covid-19, local data reveals

Up to 35% of jobs in parts of Britain are at risk due to Covid-19, a thinktank warns, calling for a new 'social contract' to avoid widespread economic insecurity.

Fresh analysis from the RSA, based on the latest furloughing data from the ONS published last Thursday and the jobs profile for each local authority, gives a new, up-to-date, robust and localised insight into which areas of Great Britain are set to be most and least affected. [See Methodology for further details.]

Richmondshire in North Yorkshire – which contains Chancellor Rishi Sunak’s constituency – tops the list of areas set to be most affected, with 35% of jobs vulnerable owing to its large hospitality and tourism sectors. 

Eden in the Lake District and East Lindsey in Lincolnshire follow. Coastal and rural areas dominate the top 20 and many affluent areas, such as the Cotswolds, feature in the list too.

 

TOP TWENTY: AREAS MOST AT RISK

Local authority	Total number of jobs at risk	Percent of jobs at risk	Region
Richmondshire	5,965	35%	Yorkshire and the Humber
Eden	7,989	34%	North West
East Lindsey	14,509	34%	East Midlands
South Lakeland	17,424	33%	North West
Derbyshire Dales	10,350	33%	East Midlands
Scarborough	14,458	33%	Yorkshire and the Humber
West Devon	5,226	32%	South West
Ryedale	7,699	32%	Yorkshire and the Humber
Argyll and Bute	10,074	32%	Scotland
Cornwall	66,878	31%	South West
Pembrokeshire	13,313	31%	Wales
Cotswold	13,526	31%	South West
South Hams	11,436	31%	South West
North Norfolk	10,063	31%	East of England
East Devon	14,716	31%	South West
Isle of Wight	15,423	31%	South East
Conwy	12,907	31%	Wales
Staffordshire Moorlands	8,733	30%	West Midlands
Torbay	13,856	30%	South West
Torridge	5,676	30%	South West

Areas with the highest proportion of jobs in the knowledge economy are least at risk. These are heavily concentrated in Oxbridge, London, and the capital's commuter belt.

But even in these areas, around one-in-five jobs is rated ‘high-risk’ based on the furloughing data. 

 

BOTTOM 20: AREAS LEAST AT RISK

Local authority	Total number of jobs at risk	Percent of jobs at risk	Region
Oxford	22,243	19%	South East
Cambridge	21,077	20%	East of England
Welwyn Hatfield	18,434	21%	East of England
Bracknell Forest	12,422	21%	South East
Wokingham	17,653	21%	South East
Reading	20,831	21%	South East
City of London	71,761	21%	London
South Cambridgeshire	17,654	21%	East of England
Tower Hamlets	48,605	22%	London
Vale of White Horse	13,477	22%	South East
Coventry	33,471	22%	West Midlands
Southwark	49,699	22%	London
Worthing	9,820	22%	South East
Stevenage	9,755	22%	South East
Slough	18,597	22%	South East
Epsom and Ewell	6,488	22%	South East
Worcester	11,606	22%	West Midlands
Camden	79,862	23%	London
Exeter	18,895	23%	South West
Rushmoor	10,783	23%	South East

To tackle this, the RSA calls for a new ‘social contract’ – the agreement of rights and responsibilities between the state, employers and employees – with a focus on universal economic security and reskilling.

In particular, the RSA reiterates its call for a shift to a Universal Basic Income, with an initial payment of £48 per adult per week, funded largely by turning the personal allowance into a payment. RSA modelling for the Scottish Government’s planned basic income pilots found this would be fiscally progressive, affordable, and would halt destitution overnight. The RSA also set out how this could become a 'full' basic income in future years.

The RSA also calls for personal learning accounts to give workers individual budgets to retrain, especially if Covid-19 brings the age of automation in even more quickly than expected.

A major report from the RSA Future Work Centre, outlining these and other policies for a new social contract in more detail will be published in May. 

  

Alan Lockey, head of the RSA Future Work Centre, said: 

“No part of the country is likely to be spared a severe recession, but those most dependent on hospitality and tourism will be particularly badly hit, especially rural areas, including many Tory shires.

“The government’s response so far has been robust, but it must avoid going back to ‘business as usual’ – including Universal Credit, sanctions and means-testing – if it’s to avoid the devastating impact of prolonged unemployment on whole swathes of the population.

“Covid-19 only highlights the need for a welfare state which addresses the economic insecurity felt by growing numbers of people in the UK."

ends 

 

Contact:  

The RSA's data is available for reuse/data visualisation with credit. For the full dataset, policy briefing or any more information, contact: Ash Singleton, [email protected], 07799 737 970.   

For a live or pre-record interview, contact: Alan Lockey, head of the RSA Future Work Centre, [email protected], 07590 619 518. 

 

Methodology: 

Wave 2 of the ONS Business Impact of Coronavirus Survey (BICS) contains data on the furloughing of workers across UK businesses between March 23 to April 5, 2020. This data includes responses from businesses that were either still trading or had temporarily paused trading.  

The RSA mapped this data against the industrial composition of different local authority districts to estimate which are most exposed to labour market risks associated with the Covid-19. The data on the industrial composition of local authorities comes from the Business Register and Employment Survey (BRES) 2018, which is publicly accessible via NOMIS.   

This approach calculates the total number of jobs at risk in each local area by identifying the number of jobs in each industry in that area multiplied by the estimated percentage of those that have been furloughed on the Government’s Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS). The RSA then divide this by the total number of jobs in each local area to calculate the percentage of jobs at risk.  

The CRJS was set up by the Government specifically to prevent growing unemployment and the National Institute for Economic and Social Research (NIESR) has described furloughed workers as technically unemployed. It therefore looks to be the best available data with which to calculate medium-term employment risk as a result of Covid-19.  

 

Notes:  

The RSA (Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce) is an independent charity which believes in a world where everyone is able to participate in creating a better future.      

Through our ideas, research and a 30,000 strong Fellowship, we are a global community of proactive problem solvers, sharing powerful ideas, carrying out cutting-edge research and building networks. We create opportunities for people to collaborate, influence, and demonstrate practical solutions to realise change.     

Our work covers a number of areas including the rise of the 'gig economy', robotics & automation; education & creative learning; and reforming public services to put communities in control.