Hiring and Recruitment Insights: March 2025

March certainly brought new challenges and opportunities in the hiring market, and with the first quarter completed, usually we can being to form a view of the recruitment landscape but my gut is that this year will be different. With national changes, such as the National Insurance increases, and international political turmoil, I think there is still a lot of change ahead for us in the coming few months so it is challenging to predict where we will be at the end of 2025.

That said, in a positive swing, regional role availability has increased by 11% compared to the start of the year with more businesses advertising for positions across the South West. If we look back to last year, in March 2024 there were 18,140 roles available across the region, and for this year that number is only slightly down to 17,483. In January, this number was 15,729, increasing to 16,185 in February.

When looking at the national picture, vacancies are largely unchanged with just a small increase of 0.1% across the country, so this tells us the South West is responding well to the economic challenges and increasing at a faster pace compared to the rest of the country. (GOV)

However, while applications per role have been on the decline, we are seeing an increased number of total applications across the same period. This shows us that more candidates are applying for roles with more choice available to them.

This is a possible indicator that there is an opening up of the economy, while slight, after the initial hesitation with the incoming changes to National Insurance rates. In the last three months we have seen the market slowly but steadily widening, with an increase of candidates looking for roles and more businesses hiring for new positions. That said, we are yet to see the impact of the recent US Tariff announcements which could have a knock-on effect for the economy here, but only time will tell.

With the late Easter, school holidays and upcoming run of bank holidays, we might except the market to flatten while people take holidays and spend time with family, before increasing again at the end of May and into June.

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