Away with the economic wintertime blues for York - in spite of the rainy weather, the city is now wearing a sunny smile.

That is the conclusion of the latest City of York Council survey which finds that after three successive quarters of declining business confidence, there was a more positive outlook for performance in the first three months of this year.

The survey, conducted in April, reflected responses from 145 local firms across a broad range of sectors, from manufacturing, construction and hotels to banking, transport and agricultural. It found that:

After steady improvement last year the first quarter of 1998 showed output slowing and a fall in the number of firms increasing turnover. Still, the balance of firms reporting an improvement over those experiencing decline still shows a strong level of turnover.

The balance of York firms expecting a rise in turnover by the end of July rose to 31.7 per cent, well over double the previous quarter's 12.3 per cent, although the figure a year ago was 51.6 per cent.

A greater proportion of businesses (67 per cent) reported no change in numbers employed. The figure was 56.6 per cent in the previous quarter and 54.8 per cent in a year on year comparison.

Meanwhile 19 per cent reported an improvement in staff levels, marginally down on the previous quarter's 20.1 per cent, but still a whole lot better than the previous year's 14.2 per cent. And the number of businesses confident of recruiting more people over the quarter to July also rose.

In spite of the strong pound, confidence about export levels remains high. Up to 32 per cent of firms were expecting to increase exports up to July while just eight per cent expected a fall.

In its introduction, the council's quarterly economic bulletin states: "The previous survey undertaken in January produced a very pessimistic picture of the likely performance of businesses in the first quarter of 1998. Confidence in terms of expected turnover was particularly low.

"Fortunately, this has not been the case - with actual figures for turnover being well above the businesses' expectations."

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