Reigate Claimant Count: Over-50s Up 27% in a Year

The number of people claiming unemployment-related benefits in Reigate & Banstead has barely moved since April. Look underneath the total, though, and the borough’s labour market has changed considerably in a year, in a way the headline figure hides completely.

2,180 people claimed in July 2026, 2.2% of residents aged 16 to 64. A year earlier it was 1,960. That is 220 more people, a rise of 11.2% (ONS claimant count, published via Nomis).

Split by age, almost all of that increase sits at the two ends of the working-age range.

The rise is at both ends, not the middle

The 25 to 49 group is the largest by a distance and it is essentially flat. The over-50s and the under-25s, between them, account for 200 of the 220 additional claims.

That matters because the two groups have very different problems. Younger claimants are typically trying to get into work for the first time, into a market where entry-level hiring has thinned. Older claimants are more often people who have lost a job they held for years, and who take longer to get back in.

The over-50s figure is a local outlier

Claims among the over-50s have risen elsewhere too, but nothing like as fast:

• Reigate & Banstead: 450 to 570, up 26.7%
• Surrey: 4,435 to 4,925, up 11.0%
• United Kingdom: 382,715 to 389,730, up 1.8%

The borough’s over-50 rise is more than twice the county’s and roughly fifteen times the national one.

Among the under-25s the picture is closer to normal. Reigate & Banstead is up 24.2%, Surrey up 21.6% and the UK up 9.7%. That is a serious rise, but the borough is broadly moving with its county.

The middle group is where the borough diverges in the other direction. Claims among 25 to 49 year olds rose 1.7% here and 0.5% across Surrey, while across the UK they fell 1.4%, from 982,545 to 968,470.

We cannot say from this data why the over-50 figure has moved as it has. The claimant count records how many people are claiming, not who they are or which employer they left. What we can say is that it is a genuine local divergence rather than a national trend reaching Surrey.

How the borough compares in Surrey

Reigate & Banstead has the second-highest number of claimants of any Surrey district, but that is mostly a function of being one of its larger boroughs. The rate is the fairer comparison, and on that measure the borough sits below the county average.

For context, the Surrey rate is 2.4%, the South East 3.1% and the United Kingdom 3.9%. On the raw rate this borough is doing better than most of the country. The direction of travel is what has changed.

The month itself, and a correction to a figure we published

Month to month, the count has been flat since the spring:

• November 2025: 1,955, the lowest month of the past year
• January 2026: 2,050
• April 2026: 2,185
• May 2026: 2,180
• June 2026: 2,165
• July 2026: 2,180

The steep climb ran from late autumn to April. Since then the figure has moved within a band of 20 people, which for a series rounded to the nearest five is no movement at all.

One correction. When we reported the June figure on 6 August, the published number was 2,190, and we called it the highest month in at least 13 months. The ONS has since revised June down to 2,165, which puts it below April’s 2,185. Revisions of that size are routine in this series, but the effect is that April, not June, was the peak. The shape of the year is unchanged.

What it means for you

If you are over 50 and out of work in this borough, you are in the group that has grown fastest here, and you are not an isolated case. The government’s free Midlife MOT service is aimed specifically at people in their 50s and 60s reviewing work, skills and pensions.

If you are claiming Universal Credit and looking for work, the claimant count includes you whether or not you would describe yourself as unemployed, which is why this figure is always higher than the unemployment rate.

If you are reading this as an employer, the local pool of experienced older candidates is larger than it was a year ago while the 25 to 49 pool is unchanged.

What this measure is, and is not. The claimant count covers people claiming Jobseeker’s Allowance plus Universal Credit claimants required to look for work. It is not the full unemployment measure, which counts anyone out of work and actively seeking it whether or not they claim anything. It is published every month at borough level, which no other jobs figure is, and that is why it is worth following. Figures are rounded to the nearest five at this geography.

Sources

• ONS claimant count, published via Nomis, dataset NM_162_1, for Reigate and Banstead (E07000211), Surrey and the United Kingdom
• Claimant count dataset notes, Nomis, on what the measure covers, its limitations and the rounding applied at local authority level