There was more evidence of Labour's jobs squeeze today with numbers of employees and vacancies dropping.
Official figures showed the market 'cooling' as struggling firms beg Rachel Reeves not to mount another tax raid at the Budget.
Unemployment was flat at 4.7 per cent in the three months to July - but there was a further hefty fall of 8,000 for the number of payrolled workers last month.
Vacancies were down 10,000 over the quarter to August.
However, separate figures showed that while sectors such as retail suffer the public sector has continued to scale up. Central government staffing was estimated at 4.04million in June, up 95,000 since Labour came to power.
