Following the publication of the latest ONS figures on the labour market, the TUC reports that the unemployment rate for BAME workers has risen at three times the speed of the rate for white workers.
TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady said:
“BME workers have borne the brunt of the pandemic. They’ve been more likely to be in low-paid, insecure work and have been put at greater risk from the virus. They’ve also been more likely to work in industries that have been hit hard by unemployment, like hospitality and retail.
Over the last year, the percentage of people from these communities who are unemployed has risen from 6.1% to 8% while among white people the rate has gone from 3.6% to 4%.
The ONS data also show that the number of people on zero-hours contracts fell from 1.08m in April-June 2020 to 917,000 in April-June 2021. The report flagged a disparity in the workers who are likely to be on such contracts, with BME women twice as likely to be on them as white men.
The TUC is now calling on the government to extend furlough and ban zero-hours contracts. The number of UK workers on payrolls rose by 182,000 between June and July, although at 28.9 million it is still 201,000 lower than before the pandemic struck, while the overall rate of unemployment had dipped to 4.7 per cent for the three-month period to the end of June.
During the pandemic unemployment rose by more than a third to 35 per cent for young black people, as against 24 per cent for those with an Asian background and 13 per cent for those who are white.
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