TMS Brisbane/Gold Coast activity reflects SE Queensland economic revival

Oct. 5, 2009 - PRLog -- TMS Asia-Pacific’s Brisbane office has reported a marked increase in its SE Queensland business activity, a sign general manager Australia/New Zealand Ainslie Hunt said is a further indicator that the local economy is well on the road to recovery.

Ms Hunt said demand for staff in general was on the increase right across the hospitality and travel sector.

“We’re seeing an increase in our temp business in the Brisbane area, and particularly within the airline sector,” she said.

“But we’ve also seen been hearing from  more and more companies who are starting to keep their eyes out for good candidates – especially in the product, marketing and sales area.

“Wholesaler contact too has increased and while the retail sector is a little quiet, many of our boutique agency clients are actively starting to replace the staff that they lost during the down turn,” she said.

The company’s activity sheet reflects strongly on figures released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics figures which indicate Queensland has once again returned to its status as one of the nation's most confident economies.

The ABS figures show the jobless rate in Queensland dropped from 5.7 per cent to 5.5 per cent across all sectors with 7000 people filling newly created roles.

Ms Hunt’s comments and the ABS results have been further exacerbated by comments made by Westpac’s Chief Economist, Bill Evans following the release of the latest Westpac-Melbourne Institute Consumer Sentiment Index survey.

The survey surged from 113.4 in August to 119.3 in early September.

According to Mr Evans the result, which represents a 34.4 per cent increase over the last four months, was the highest level the Index has reached since July 2007 and the largest four month increase in the 35 year history of the Index.

”The pace of improvement in the growth rate of the Index (up 1.1% – the largest monthly rise since April 2003) points to a significant improvement in growth prospects in 2010,” he said.

-ENDS-