MORE than a third of employees in Cornwall have been placed on furlough since the Government’s coronavirus job retention scheme began in April.

The county’s employers have furloughed 35 percent of the workforce, while in Devon it’s 32 percent, with 185,100 employees across the two counties spending at least some time at home away from their workplace during the pandemic.

Figures released this week by HMRC cover the period up to the end of June, and show how many people in each consituency and local authority have been furloughed, as well as how many self-employed people have claimed the Self Employed Income Support grant.

In the country as a whole, by the end of June, 9.4million employees had been placed on furlough, at a total cost of £26.5 billion, with employers in the hospitality sector the most likely to furlough staff (87 percent of employers).

Meanwhile, of 3.4 million self-employed people identified by HMRC as eligible for a support grant, 2.6 million had claimed by the end of June, to a total of £7.4 billion. The average value of each claim was £2900.

The sector with the highest number of eligible self-employed individuals and the highest proportion of claims was the construction industry, whose claims represented £3.1 billion of the total.

Some of the figures broken down into local authority and constituency are as follows:

For the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (number of employees furloughed up to end of June)

Cornwall 79,000 out of 226,000 eligible (35 percent)

Devon 105,000 employes out of 330,000 eligible (32 percent)

South East Cornwall 10,800 out of 34,000 (31 percent)

North Cornwall 10,000 out of 35,000 (37 percent)

South West Devon 11,700 out of 41,200 (28 percent)

The local authority with the highest proportion of employees furloughed was South Lakeland at 40% and the lowest was Boston in Lincolnshire at 20%.

For the Self Employed Income Support Grant the figures are:

Cornwall 30,400 people out of 40,300 identified as eligible (76 percent)

A total of £84.8 million claimed, average claim £2800

Devon 39,600 out of 54,000 eligible (73 percent)

A total of £114.7 million claimed, average claim £2900

SE Cornwall – 4900 out of 6500 people (£13.6 million claimed)

North Cornwall – 5,800 out of 7,800 people (£16.3 million claimed)

North Devon – 5,500 out of 7,400 people (£15.7 million claimed)

Torridge and West Devon – 5,800 out of 8,100 people (£16.3 million claimed)