Turnover in the UK’s recruitment industry has bounced back by more than 25% to just under £25bn, according to the Recruitment Industry Trends Survey 2010/11 launched today [9 November] by the Recruitment & Employment Confederation (REC).

The report, which covers April 2010 to March 2011, reveals a sharp upsurge in annual industry turnover to £24.6bn, an increase of 25.3%, compared to £19.7bn in the same period the previous year (April 2009 to March 2010).

The REC predicts a medium-term forecast for single digit growth over the next four years, with the industry expected to peak at over £30bn in 2014/15.

However, more recent data since May from the REC’s Report on Jobs (see recruiter.co.uk First job fall in two years, says REC, 9 November) confirms that the market has slowed markedly, reflecting the ongoing economic uncertainty.

At the launch of the survey in London today, Kevin Green, chief executive of the REC, said that they were surprised by the findings: “The results demonstrate how resilient our industry is. We’ve got a long way to go — with the public sector cuts we’re just six months in to the four-year austerity plan.”

However, he saw this as an opportunity for companies to find more creative ways of doing business by having better use of flexible resources. “The government now recognises how important the flexible labour market is to the UK economy,” he said.

Here are the key findings of the survey:

• Turnover in temporary/contract staffing has returned to 2006/2007 levels at £22bn compared to its low point last year of £17.8bn, a rise of 24.1%.
• Permanent recruitment also rallied to reach £2.5bn in the past year, a massive 37% increase on £1.8bn recorded in 2009/10.
• Volumes of perms placements rose by 38.3% from 436,822 last year to 604,193 in 2010/11 while temp placements were up 19.3% and top the million mark again at 1,049,333 compared to 879,000 last year.
• The number of people working in recruitment has gone up 13.1% from 80,528 last year to 91,114 this year.
• The REC’s Medium Term Forecast predicts the recruitment industry’s annual growth at 3.6% next year (2011/12) followed by 4.7% in 2012/13, rising to 7.1% for 2013/14 and 7.3% in 2014/15. This represents a return to single figure growth over the next four years to reach a new peak of £30.8bn in 2014/15.