Michael Page still hopes for UK jobs growth

The boss of recruitment giant Michael Page today admitted Britain is the black sheep of all the markets it works in — the only place yet to record growth.

Chief executive Steve Ingham said that although London's banking sector was recovering — with his staff now having twice as many banking jobs to fill compared with the same time last year — the UK business was lagging behind Asia, Australia, Europe, Africa and the Middle East.

He said Michael Page would not need to expand its own workforce in the first half of the year.

"We can take quite a bit of new gross profit through our existing workforce," Ingham explained.

"Last quarter, we picked up £8 million more gross profit but only hired five new people."

Michael Page posted an 86% slump in operating profit for 2009, at £20.2 million.

Michael Page, which operates in 28 countries, offered shareholders a dividend of 5.12p, taking the total pay-out for the year to 8p.