Increased scrutiny from regulators has led to a significant rise in the number of job vacancies in the UK insurance industry in the past three months.
Recruitment firm Robert Walters said vacancies in the sector increased by 14% from 27,030 in January to March to 30,719 between April and June, based on the number of insurance jobs posted online.
Richard Johnson, insurance manager at the recruiter, said the increase in available roles was due to regulatory and compliance demands from the Financial Conduct Authority and the Prudential Regulatory Authority (PRA).
He said: "I would say at least 70% of risk and compliance roles have stemmed from regulatory deadlines and their expectations of insurance companies.
"You could say that regulatory requirements have also led to boards increasing the size of audit functions to give them more oversight and more 'eyes on the ground' - taking this into consideration you could say 50-60% of requirements have been attributed to this," he said.
The recruitment firm said the year-on-year rise in insurance jobs was 8% compared with 28,426 in Q2 2014.
Vacancies in London increased by 13% over the past year. The recruiter said rises in other regions were also strong due to their operating costs being lower than in London. Roles in north west England went up by 29% compared with 12 months ago, while the Midlands saw a 22% increase during the same period.
Johnson predicted vacancies would continue to increase in the third quarter due to Solvency II demands for the Senior Insurance Managers Regime (SIMR). Under the regime, firms are required by the PRA to submit a governance map, which clarifies the accountability and responsibility of individual senior managers and directors and sets out responsibilities for each key function holder.
"Moving into the third quarter we expect to see demand continuing to increase as companies prepare for the Solvency II January deadline and submit information for the SIMR," he added.
