Katherine Heffernan | 20 Jan 2026

Headline unemployment rate remains at 5.1% for second successive month

While the headline employment rate is unchanged this quarter, the number of people in employment has fallen according to both the Labour Force Survey (LFS) and HMRC’s estimates of payrolled employees. Meanwhile the quarterly unemployment rate is showing at 5.1%, also the same as last month, with younger people particularly affected, and redundancy data points to further weakening. 

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