The growing consumer inflation has lead to thousands of UK employees taking second jobs to get by. On standard salaries, professionals at the bottom end of the pay scale are finding it increasingly hard to make ends meet. Many of them are taking freelance work or temp work to pay rising utility bills, food cost and petrol prices. The question is how long will they have to do this for?
The German supermarket chain Aldi aims to reverse the trends currently being seen in the retail sector thanks to the credit crunch and people subsequently curbing their spending patterns.
The chain is spending £1.5 billion on a 5 year expansion plan across the UK, opening 1 store every week. The growth from 400 stores to 1500 stores will see the business hire some 1,500 staff in the UK this year alone. This is great news for the business and will provide lots of jobs in the retail sector nationally.
Merrill Lynch, one of the world’s leading financial firms, is to open a Dublin branch creating 31 jobs. The office will handle assets for clients who have invested money in funds across Europe and Asia.
The Equalities Bill is expected to force employers to disclose salary structures to make the 40% pay difference between men and women more transparent.
The Bill will encourage firms to discriminate in favour of female and ethnic minority job candidates, effectively discriminating against white men. Minister Harriet Harman told GMTV “Most women are just as committed to their jobs, yet if you are a woman working part time, your get 40% less per hour on average than a man working full time”.
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Car company Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) is to create up to 600 jobs under a £700m investment plan. This expansion comes not long after the company was bought by Tata Motors from Ford for £1.7bn.
The recruitment drive aims to attract engineers to work on new technology and product devlopment programmes, althoguht there will also be jobs in purchasing, finance and human resources. Also a new programme for more than 80 graduates to join the business in Spetember is being launched.
Most of the jobs will be at the firm’s devlopment centre in Gaydon, Warwickshire. JLR currently employs some 16,000 people at plants in Solihull and Liverpool, as well as the devlopment centres at Gaydon and Coventry.
