AIBU to think redundancy crisis is not getting enough media coverage?

And I am not against migration per se. It just doesn't tally with the redundancy crisis

I know people in various different types of role in different industries who are either being made redundant or who are about to be subject to restructuring which will result in redundancies.

I work for the NHS, which in England alone is going to have made about 20,000 people redundant by the end of the 2025/26 financial year. I think you're in a very fortunate position if absolutely nobody you know is at any risk of redundancy now or in the immediate future.

Same with pretty much all.the professions on the visa list - hotel management, engineering, working in corner shops and vape shops.

We can't possibly need migrants when we have a huge pool of people who can't find work

What I don't get is why we have a redundancy crisis but there are no huge programmes to retrain people in shortage careers like nursing. It's mind boggling we can have a redundancy crisis yet our hospitals are full of nursing staff who can barely speak basic English.

The only redundancy I’ve heard is my friend in CS based in London. There’s an offer of vol redundancy which she is going to take as the package is good and she’s been there 17 years (at age 40). She has looked and there’s lots of jobs apparently in her field (economist).

My

I’d love to retrain in something. I’m not stupid and feel I’m at a standstill with my job search. I’m usually not qualified enough for a change of industry…but no one wants to train anyone! Apprenticeships are few and far between and most are, let’s say, stretching the definition and don’t seem to give a genuinely useful qualification.

I've just been made redundant from a biotech, as has a friend from a big bank.

A few businesses in my field have laid off this year. I have enough of a payout to last a year but still worried at 48 about what it's like out there in the market!

I loved the old job centre format, its hard to explain how easy it was when no computers were involved.

You saw tons of jobs on bits of paper, on boards , that you would never thought to search for if it was online, but you know you could do it. Ring the number, came in for an interview that afternoon 😭.

You clearly don't know anyone who works in Local Government. We have been losing people to 'restructurings' for many years now. Every couple of years another round of ' restructuring' comes along. So I know a great many people made redundant. Latest was a colleague in her 30s. Whole teams have gone this way, as well as colleagues within teams.

I do know people in their late 50s being made redundant and getting pay offs. I think in previous generations they might have taken retirement by now.

People could literally walk into the job centre and be sent for an interview and get a job the same day. An older woman at my work had her first job there and that was standard.
And the poor kids today have to live in a world with the internet/right to work checks etc, so that will never happen for them (even if the jobs were available)

I would repeat the question of the previous poster- is there a crisis? You have to inform the government if you want to make more than 20, presumably so they can mange this to avoid a crisis.

And age definitely plays it's part once over 50 it's tough.
The older workers seen in supermarkets have generally been there donkeys years and new starts tend to be under 30.
They have the occasional 50+start but it's rare.
My DW has worked in a supermarket 18 years.

The harm to the economy this Labour government did under Starmer/Reeves is only going to grow under unfunded Andy. Sick pay from day one and all the rest mean that dismissing under capability is a hugely long and expensive process. Smaller firms without a dedicated HR department will look at the Byzantine employment law around capability, the weeks and weeks of meetings and adjustments and more meetings and appeals they must hold to terminate a poor worker and of course they will opt for redundancies.

The only positive thing that can be said about this lot is that they are ensuring we will not suffer a Labour government for a generation.

it's not just engineering, but the UK is a desert, and universities don't attract enough people either.

It's only going to get worst

Unemployment fell in the most recent 3m reported (ONS) to 4.9%.

It peaked at 5.3% during Covid.

Prior to that the last big spike was 2011 8.5%.

1992 spike 10.7%.

There are well-documented problems with the Labour Market Survey, which generates this data. Nevertheless, the evidence is that unemployment isn't at a level that would mean it is in the news every day.

One of the issues with it is it doesn’t capture the large amount of unofficial employment in hidden economic activity

it' only part of the story, but I am amazed no-one was waiting for the consequences from Brexit. Companies have steadily relocated, business have moved, people have rushed to get European passports and use them, many businesses have simply refused to keep trading with the uk. It's just too complicated and not worth it they just stopped,, often it doesn't go any further than that. So overseas businesses may have lost clients here, obviously, but they have also closed markets.

What did people think was going to happen?

And that's only ONE of the reasons things come crashing.

I know, I was using that as an example of what people advise on here when a poster says My DH was made redundant 6 months ago and can't find work in his industry .
The find any job brigade forget that being over qualified is also a thing.

@Doingtheboxerbeat The any job bit such as Asda etc is a fallacy these jobs are hard to land and also get hundreds of applicants and are nearly always 30hrs and way under.