Firms plan to stop laying off staff in early 2010 for the first time in more than a year, but only finance firms and utility companies plan to increase hiring, according to recruitment firm Manpower.

Its quarterly employment outlook survey published yesterday showed a seasonally adjusted net balance of zero per cent of firms planned to cut jobs in the first three months of 2010, up from minus one per cent in the last survey and the highest reading since the third quarter of 2008. The findings, based on a poll of 2,100 employers, is the latest in a raft of activity surveys that suggest Britain's economy may have come through the worst of the downturn.

The number of Britons without a job rose to 2.461 million in the three months to September, according to official data, but the rate of increase has slowed in recent months.

Manpower said its survey suggested the jobless total would not now hit three million in 2010 as many experts have predicted.

However, policymakers have been perplexed by the slower pace of job losses compared with past recessions and are concerned that companies may yet be forced to axe staff if the recovery turns out to be muted.

A breakdown of the Manpower survey showed firms in only two out of nine sectors planned to hire staff: finance and business services and utilities. Finance firms planned to take on staff at their fastest pace since the third quarter of 2008.

But while hiring intentions improved in four out of nine sectors compared with last quarter's survey, it deteriorated in the remaining five sectors, the recruitment firm said.

"Manpower's survey provides a useful reality check that although the recession is probably over, we are still some way away from longer term stability," said Alan Clarke, economist at BNP Paribas.