Member Article

Greater Manchester economy improving as recovery gains pace

The latest data from the Manchester Monitor – a snapshot of Greater Manchester’s latest socio-economic indicators – shows that key factors with the region’s economy are continuing to improve.

These include:

· Hotel occupancy rates in Manchester city centre were recorded at 78.3% in August 2014, up 1.5 percentage points from the same month last year. For Greater Manchester (GM) as a whole, average occupancy rates in August were 78.1%, a rise of 0.3 percentage points compared to the August 2013 figure.

· Manchester Airport handled more than 2.4 million passengers in July 2014, 138,500 (6.1%) more than 12 months previously. Month-on-month passenger numbers also grew, up from 2.25 million in June, a rise of 7.2%.

· The number of apprentices has grown to over 30,000 in 2012/13 – a rise of 141% compared with 2008/9. However, many apprentices are older people in their 30s, 40s and 50s who are already in work rather than school-leavers struggling to find employment. Apprenticeship starts among adults over 25 grew from 2,472 in 2008/9 to 13,485 (a rise of 446%). Apprenticeship growth has been especially strong among women.

· The average house in GM cost £107,623 in August 2014, an increase of 5.4% (£5,841) compared with the corresponding month in 2013. This remains below the annual increase of 7.7% (£13,708) in England & Wales, with a national property costing an average of £177,824.

· Just fewer than 47,000 people were claiming Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA) in GM in August 2014 – a decrease of 2,700 (5.5%) when compared with the figure for July 2014 of 49,600. In annual terms the number of JSA claimants in GM is 29,800 (38.8%) lower than in August 2013.

Stephen Overell, principal for employment and skills, said: “The economy is making strong progress on many different fronts, with hotel occupancy now exceeding pre-recession rates and Manchester Airport experiencing its busiest ever year.

“The ongoing year-on-year drop in Jobseeker’s Allowance claimants is also encouraging, although the impact of Universal Credit on these figures should be taken into account.

“Apprenticeships are growing in popularity and the recent speeches by party leaders suggest they are set to expand much further in the years ahead. However, apprentices are changing.

“Although the stereotype is of young men wielding spanners and wearing hard hats, women in care, customer service and administrative roles who are over 25 years old can justifiably claim to be the typical apprentice.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Simon Malia .