This page contains data and analysis published by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) from 25 to 29 May 2020. Go to our live page for the most up-to-date insights on COVID-19.
29 May 2020
Children returning to school
Some children, in England, are set to return to school on 1 June 2020 as part of new guidance set out by the government. Initially, this is limited to Early Years, Reception, Year 1 and Year 6 children. We estimate that there are approximately 2.1 million children in the year groups, making up around 43% of all primary school children.
There are up to 680,000 families that could expect all of their children to return to school, equivalent to 17.5% of all families with primary or early years aged children. This could potentially allow an estimated 1 million people, in employment in these families, to return to work. This is around 3.8% of the total workforce in England.
One talking point around this policy has been the potential impact on older generations. The Labour Force Survey suggests that 87.2% of primary aged children live in households where no one is over the age of 50. Meanwhile, 7.3% of primary children live with someone aged 50 to 59 years and 1.7% live with someone aged 70 years and over.
A small minority of children due to return to school are living with someone aged 70 years and over
Primary-aged children living in a household, by age of oldest household member, England, October to December 2019
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This and further breakdowns are available as a user-requested dataset.
28 May 2020
Online job adverts
Figures for online job adverts show that the number of adverts declined more than 50% from the start of March to the start of May 2020. Prior to this, they had been relatively stable since the beginning of 2019.
There were large declines in the categories of catering and hospitality, and wholesale and retail. There was a smaller fall in education, while the number of job adverts in health and social care showed little or no change. These are experimental estimates, which are created based upon job adverts provided by Adzuna.
Total online job vacancies declined more than 50% from the start of March to the start of May 2020
Total weekly job adverts on Adzuna, UK: index 2019 average = 100
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Notes:
- The observations were collected on a roughly weekly basis; however, they were not all observed at the same point in each week, leading to slightly irregular gaps between each observation.
- These series have a small number of missing weeks, mostly in late 2019, and latest is in January 2020. These values have been imputed using linear interpolation.
- The figure for total adverts in education on 21 March 2019 was anomalous and has been replaced with an imputed value.
27 May 2020
Life under lockdown
People in Great Britain spent far less time travelling during April 2020 because of the coronavirus (COVID-19) lockdown, allowing more time for things like sleep and rest, free time, gardening and DIY.
Time spent providing childcare rose for those with children in the household, with friends and relatives outside the household unable to provide as much support as they normally would. For example, over-60s reduced their time spent providing childcare by 90% following social distancing restrictions.
This analysis compares results of our online time-use study conducted entirely under lockdown (28 March and 26 April 2020) with previous data gathered under “normal circumstances” in 2014 to 2015.
Daily travel time fell by more than an hour during lockdown
Average time spent per day on selected activities, 2014 to 2015 (UK) and March to April 2020 (Great Britain)
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The impact of the lockdown on people’s lives varies by income group. Those in high-income households have seen the greatest fall in travel time and a corresponding rise in time spent working from home. They also report having more free time than normal.
Meanwhile, people in low-income households were more likely to continue working outside the home, their increase in free time was smaller than higher-income households and time spent working away from home was unchanged.
The highest-income group was most likely to report an increase in free time during the lockdown
Change in average time spent per day on selected activities, by income group, 2014 to 2015 (UK) and March to April 2020 (Great Britain)
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26 May 2020
Social impact of COVID-19 by country and region
The effects of the coronavirus (COVID-19) lockdown are being felt more keenly in some parts of Great Britain than others.
While 80% of adults in Great Britain were somewhat or very worried about the effect that the coronavirus was having on their life between 3 April and 3 May 2020, this varied from 76% in the East Midlands and in Scotland, to 87% in the North East.
These differences were even more obvious among 16- to 34-year-olds, with 94% in the North East somewhat or very worried, compared with 67% in the East of England, South East and East Midlands.
There were also differences in the topic that people were most concerned about, when they said they were somewhat or very worried.
London residents were most concerned about their health, well-being or access to care (30%) and people in Yorkshire and The Humber were the most likely to mention work, school or university (29%).
Londoners were the most concerned about their health, well-being or access to care
Main worry that people who were somewhat worried or very worried had about the effect the coronavirus would have on their life, country or region, 3 April to 3 May 2020
Source: Office for National Statistics – Opinions and Lifestyle Survey
Notes:
Download this chart Londoners were the most concerned about their health, well-being or access to care
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