A “nightmarish” situation; that’s what 1.5 million job seekers currently face, according to a recent report by The Guardian. Amid turbulent financial times and some of the most “extreme” market conditions ever known, these people are experiencing “slim pickings for good roles” and intense competition for those roles.

Standing out amongst 1.5 million people is hard, and tailoring a CV and cover letter for each application is a time-consuming process. So, when you do find “good roles”, there shouldn’t be any guesswork involved.

But guesswork is exactly what candidates are often faced with because around half of job adverts do not include information on the role’s proposed salary. It renders job seeking a lottery, with experienced candidates outpricing themselves and being met with instant email rejections that read along the lines of “we are unable to proceed with your application due to misalignment in compensation expectations.” The same is the case for candidates who may believe they have to ask for a lower salary than they would like. 

This is an inordinate waste of precious time for candidates who are working hard to find roles they believe are suitable and diligently applying for them. It doesn’t help that the language of job adverts is designed to elevate responsibilities in order to attract candidates. In some cases these are simply misleading and it is unfair for candidates to be duped into applying for roles whose salaries are below what they would expect.

This petition seeks to end this guesswork and make it law that job adverts must include a proposed salary range. This will ensure that job seekers aren’t wasting countless hours applying to jobs that they believe they are suitable for, only to find out that they’re too experienced / inexperienced.

Let’s streamline the job seeking process and put the power back where it needs to be; in the hands of candidates. This will reduce stress and avert a possible mental ill health crisis (with people being out of work), and put skilled workers in roles that are needed to drive the economy forward.

Quotes from The Guardian taken from: https://www.theguardian.com/money/2025/feb/10/britons-hunting-for-a-job-uk-jobseekers-pay