Private sector employment has risen for the fourth month in a row in May, according to latest data from Bank of Scotland.

The headline Bank of Scotland PMI – a seasonally adjusted index monitoring activity across Scotland’s manufacturing and service sectors - rose to 53.1 in May, from 51.6 in April.

The rate at which companies added to their staff numbers was the fastest in seven months, while panellists reported that greater inflows of new business and company expansion plans had led to the latest rise in headcounts.
 
Donald MacRae, chief economist at Bank of Scotland, says: “Output growth is showing a welcome recovery, the fastest we have seen in the last three months. After a worrying two-month period of decline, service sector activity has returned to growth in May, reporting a promising rise in new business for the first time in three months.

“However, the sharp rise in average input costs during May is of concern, with the pace of inflation again faster than that seen in the wider UK economy. The Scottish economy is slowly emerging from recession, although at a lower pace than the UK as a whole.”