The Office for National Statistics released the official labour market figures on Thursday (18th June) and they don’t make for pretty reading, revealing a step rise in unemployment between February and April.  This got us to thinking, now the recession is officially one year old, how has it affected the UK labour market?  And as we found a report to rip off, we thought we’d tell you! So the cold hard (and hopefully undoctored!) facts supplied by the good people at the Office of National Statistics show that June 2008 and June 2009 the total number of people in employment is down 0.4million.  The private sector has been hit hardest loosing 0.7million jobs, whilst there has actually been a rise of 250,000 jobs (which equals 5%) in the public sector.  The demographics greatest hit by job losses has been men and young people in general.  And finally manufacturing has been given a special mention.  This is an industry that could have been hit far harder with thousands more people losing their jobs if they hadn’t have rallied around and implemented alternatives to redundancy such as shorter working weeks and voluntary pay cuts.  Here’s a video to help you understand the effects of the recession

We’ve done a fair bit of good news reporting over the last week or so, so it only seems fair that we find you some bad news too.  Yes that’s right good old Boss Hanson has done it again, levelled the playing fields, de-greened the grass and found you some bad news to equal out the good.  I fear my equal opportunities training may have impaired my writing. Unfortunately it seems that the public sector could be heading for a crash if Mystic John Philpott over at the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development is right.  John’s crack team of statisticians, psychics and development professionals are predicting that over the next 5 years as many as 350,000 jobs could be lost in the Public Sector if the government pursues spending cut proposals. John said: “Cuts on this scale would still leave the public sector workforce bigger that it was when Gordon Brown became Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1997, leaving ample scope for a new government of whatever hue to take an even bigger axe to public-sector jobs after the general election�.  A not so subtle dig there from John at David ‘devious’ Cameron and his book balancing plans fuelled by public spending cuts.  Poor old Gordon, it appears another nail maybe hovering over his coffin.  If you still fancy working in the public sector these videos might help.

All quiet on the Northern Rock front you’ve been thinking? Well our favourite non-doms CEO Ron Sandler and CFO Ann Godbehere (where?) were up in front of MPs at the Treasury Select Committee this week telling them that, surprise surprise, the drop in the housing market meant they needed a six month extension to the repayment of the £24bn they borrowed from the tax payer. Before we all groan, they do expect to repay £7bn this year and have the whole matter tied up within 3 years. Good work. And now might be a good time to get your foot in the door…

The impact of Tesco on local high streets is to become part of the syllabus in a modern “make-over” for GCSE geography - which will include the influence of retail giants and climate change. Tesco’s expansion has drawn criticism from those who fear that it threatens the diversity of local, independent shops - with accusations that it was creating “Tesco towns”. Geography students will be able to examine the retailer’s “socio-economic impact on high streets”. The environmental campaigners’ education co-ordinator, Vicki Felgate, says that “issues such as how our consumer choices impact upon the world around us is vital to giving young people an understanding of how they can be responsible citizens”. Pupils will also be allowed to present work as cartoons, videos or poems. Or songs, or potato prints, or mood charts, no doubt. Jamie feels “raincloud.â€� No wonder think-tank civitas is worried about the hollowing-out of academia.

James Campbell, a retired art teacher, claimed he was a victim of disability discrimination because he is bald, but has lost his claim against Falkirk council. He told the Glasgow tribunal he had suffered from harassment at the hands of pupils because of his baldness which they saw as a weakness. He claimed his baldness had a “substantial and long term adverse effect” on his ability to do his job. But the judge ruled baldness was “not an impairment”.  Try telling that to Nicolas Cage. The judge went on to say: “If baldness was to be regarded as an impairment then perhaps a physical feature such as a big nose, big ears might of themselves be regarded as an impairment.â€� Hang on – he is talking about Nicolas Cage!!