The latest survey from small business group ISME says trading conditions are still 'extremely difficult', with a sharp fall in employment levels in the past three months.
40% of the 400 companies surveyed are employing fewer people since the previous three months, with only 15% employing more. The gap of 25 percentage points is up 10 from the last survey. Construction recorded the weakest employment figures, followed by distribution.
The ISME survey shows that business confidence picked up slightly, but a net 47% of firms were less confident about their prospects than they were 12 months ago. The previous survey's 53% was a 20-year low.
A net 18% of firms reported that their turnover was now less than in the same period last year. 55% of companies said their sales or order books were down, while 37% said they had experienced cancellations of orders in the last three months. 70% of these cancellations were from local Irish companies.
When asked to identify their biggest business concern, economic uncertainty was again top of the list with 47%, followed by reduced orders (13%) and labour costs (9%).
