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Britain's largest recruitment company is not expecting a slowdown in the public sector jobs market, despite fears over government spending. Hays Group issued its preliminary results for the year to the City last week, and with them, an upbeat prediction on its public sector performance, despite uncertainty about future government spending. The figures revealed that public sector recruitment had been key to the company holding up, despite the recession. A ‘chronic shortage' of education and healthcare staff has driven strong demand for both full-time and temporary placements. Alistair Cox, chief executive, explained: ‘We've seen particularly strong demand for secondary school teachers, social workers and clinicians at the NHS. And this has suited us, as we have an international pool network of workers.' The firm admitted it had been trading in difficult market conditions, particularly in the second half of the year, with temporary placement net fees down 7% and permanent placement net fees down 29%. The downturn also forced the company to cut 1,250 jobs and close 43 offices. Pre-tax profits fell 43% to £151m, but cash generated by operations reached £260.9m, and demand for public sector workers increased by 5%. Hays revealed it would now focus on ‘targeted' international expansion and investing for the long term, including key IT efficiency projects. Mr Cox said the public sector would remain strong. He said: ‘It is a large market, and we hope to continue growing our market share.' He added: ‘The recruitment markets in the past year have been the most challenging on record. ‘While we anticipate that 2010 will be another tough year for our industry, we will continue to take advantage of the downturn to build market share and pursue our investment plans to strengthen our operations for the long term.'

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BUSINESS

Hays 'upbeat' over jobs market future

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