CEBR: Public spending a significant proportion of GDP outlay

People in HR jobs may be interested by new figures that show public spending has increased across the UK.

With a looming recession in the sector, as forecast by many employment experts, and the seeming inevitability of cuts in resources for the industry, areas with greater dependency on such funding could be hurt most.

Data from the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR), an independent consultancy offering advice to organisations, found that the north-east had the highest proportion of public spending as gross domestic product in England at 64 per cent.

In Northern Ireland and Wales, that level is 70 per cent and comfortably above the UK average of 48.4 per cent.

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Furthermore, the CEBR commented that two-thirds of the fiscal crisis was as result of "excess rise" in public spending.

Financial expert Dr Ros Altmann, in response to the government Budget pledges on public spending and cuts last month, said that rather than a decrease, the figures implied an increase in outgoings and that the Treasury had failed to rein in its outlay of taxpayer resources to the sector.

By Ross George