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More than two out of five UK companies expect to hire more people next year despite concerns over the long-term impact of Brexit, according to an annual survey from the Confederation of British Industry and recruitment agency Pertemps.

The CBI/Pertemps Network Group Employment Trends Survey for 2016, which surveyed 353 firms employing 1.2 million people in the UK, found that 41% of respondents will recruit more staff next year.

Just 13% of firms expected to reduce their staff numbers in 2017, while 44% expected no change next year.

The majority of new roles are likely to be permanent jobs, with 19% of companies forecasting to create permanent positions in next year and just 2% likely to crate temporary roles. Some 26% of respondents said they would create apprenticeship positions in 2017.

However, 58% expressed longer term concerns over access to skilled migrants once Brexit is enacted.

The survey, carried out between August and September 2016, found that the balance of companies saying they would hire compared to those that would cut jobs fell slightly to +28% from +30% last year.

Josh Hardie, deputy-director general at CBI commented: “Businesses are 100% committed to making the best of Brexit. However, this year’s survey does show a greater sense of concern about the UK’s long-term attractiveness as a place to create jobs.

“Getting our industrial strategy right and understanding what the UK’s future relationship with the EU will be, will help ensure that this worry does not negatively impact the future performance of the labour market.”

The CBI had previously forecast before June’s vote that leaving the EU could see the loss of 950,000 UK jobs by 2020.

Morning update

There were a number of retail stories in the papers across the weekend (see Media Bites), but it’s a low-key start to what looks like a low-key week in the City as we lead-up to Christmas Day next Sunday.

On the markets this morning, after bursting through the 7,000pt barrier on Friday this FTSE 100 has dipped back 0.2% to 6,995pts this morning.

There’s little dramatic movement so far in the grocery sector. The biggest movers are McColl’s Retail Group (MCLS), down 2.6% to 184.6p, Stock Spirits Group (STCK), up 1.7% to 178p, Applegreen (APGN), up 1.1% to 365p and Unilever (ULVR), up 1% to 3,183p.

Fallers so far include Real Good Food (RGD), down 1.2% to 35.1p, Crawshaw Group (CRAW) down 1.1% to 21p, SSP Group (SSPG), down 1.1% to 379.6p and PayPoint (PAY), down 1.1% to 935p.

This week in the City

The week leading up to Christmas is a crucial period of the wider grocery industry, but the financial updates for the festive period will only begin to come in in January as the City is likely to remain very quiet this week.

Scheduled updates across the grocery and fmcg industry are few and far between, with just a second quarter trading update tomorrow in the US from General Mills and Sodastream’s annual shareholder meeting on Friday in the diary.

In terms of economic announcements, the Office for National Statistics releases its final figures for UK economic growth in the third quarter of the year on Friday.

Tomorrow morning sees the release of the CBI Distributive Trades survey for December, while the GFK Consumer Confidence survey is out on Friday.

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