The number of active job adverts in the UK continued to increase during September, with the total reaching 1.21 million last week - 1.8% higher than the previous week. The REC’s Jobs Recovery Tracker shows a trend of steady growth in job postings in recent weeks. This is mainly down to a drive in hiring ‘key worker’ roles across logistics, warehouse, cleaning, and supermarket jobs. While last week’s advice to work from home may have an impact on hiring, it’s hoped that keeping the country largely operational will help.

With many children having returned to the classroom, there was a notable increase in adverts for school support roles like lunchtime supervisors and school secretaries (+13.6%). There was also a smaller rise for teachers. The rise in demand for childminders (+10.2%) and play workers (+7.7%) is driven by people returning to workplaces, either as workplaces re-opened or as term-time workers returned to work.

Vacancies for logistics and warehouse roles are up 24% to 43,200, as demand for home deliveries has soared. Amazon announced plans to create 7,000 new jobs this year, while Tesco announced last month it would hire 16,000 permanent staff. Aldi is to create another 4,000 jobs with the opening of 100 new stores and a new online ordering service as part of a £1.3bn investment drive in the UK. Analysis by Yahoo Finance UK found supermarkets have taken on at least 136,000 staff since the pandemic began. Healthcare and nursing remains the most in-demand sector, with 74,800 roles currently available.

Cambridge and Guildford both recorded higher levels of jobs than jobseekers, with IT roles the most in-demand. Vacancies in the UK’s digital sector have risen by 36% since June, according to analysis from government-backed entrepreneur network Tech Nation. Around 90,000 jobs a week were listed. In Belfast and Cambridge, more than one in four vacant roles was in the digital sector. Tech Nation also said there was “considerable evidence” that non-tech firms, such as Tesco and Amazon, were increasingly recruiting for tech roles.

The latest REC UK Report on Jobs signalled that temp vacancies are leading the demand in hiring with billings expanding at the quickest rate for 20 months. Temporary vacancies increased across three of the ten monitored sectors during August, with Blue Collar seeing the strongest rate of expansion. Neil Carberry, Chief Executive of the REC, said: “Temporary work is critical in any recovery - businesses turn to temps to help them ramp up and meet demand while the future looks uncertain. Past recessions show that temporary work bounces back more quickly – it is one of our jobs market’s biggest strengths and that’s really showing now.”

Here are some of the companies that are advertising 50 or more UK roles on their websites. (Last updated on 25 September)