Permanent staff placements by recruiters have continued to slow in June, according to a survey published on Wednesday.

This continues the trend set in May, where the number of job vacancies made available also fell to their slowest in 2015.

The report cited a lack of skilled candidates as the reason for the slow growth.

“Recruiters are struggling to fill vacancies for everything from software engineers to sales,” Bernard Brown, a partner at KPMG, said.

Job data will be watched closely by the Bank of England, who are predicted to raise interest rates from its record low of 0.5% in the near future. The market predicts the first rise in the UK Bank Rate around May or June 2016, with the conensus of economist views pointing to March.