Jobs slump in Oxford as Prime Minister pledges £5bn for hospitals, schools and roads

That is according to the Institute for Employment Studies, which collected data from Adzuna – one of the UK’s largest online job search engines.

The think tank warns many people struggling before the pandemic will now be even worse off, and says much more must be done to support livelihoods.

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There were 2,194 job vacancies in Oxford on June 14 – 68 per cent fewer than on March 15, the date the IES used as the benchmark for pre-crisis vacancy levels.

This was among the largest drops in the UK. Across the country, the number of vacancies plunged to 367,000 on June 14 – 55 per cent lower than the 820,000 jobs advertised before the virus rocked the economy.

The news came as Prime Minister Boris Johnson pledged an immediate £5bn investment in infrastructure spending on hospitals, schools and roads.

Responding to the announcement, Shadow Chancellor Anneliese Dodds, Labour MP for Oxford East, said Labour supported investment, but a “strong laser-like focus on unemployment” was needed.

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She urged the government to abandon a “one-size fits all approach” to economic support, calling for measures “more focused” on individual sectors.

She added that spending to improve prisons and courts had been promised “quite some time ago,” adding: “What the prime minister is talking about appears to be mainly spending that’s already been committed to”.

Ms Dodds said: “Unemployment has climbed to its highest level in a generation and our country is suffering.”

Tony Wilson, director of the IES, said: “This crisis has affected all parts of the economy, but it’s clear that it is hitting some places harder than others.

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“Many of these areas were struggling before this crisis began and are in even more trouble now.”