University towns and southern English cities dominate the employment hotspots, according to recent research.

Hull tops the list of unemployment black holes with 45 job seekers for every open vacancy, new research by job search website Adzuna finds. There are 18,795 people in the Hull area looking for work yet there are only 318 jobs available to them out of nearly 400,000 live vacancies listed the job site nationally. Sunderland comes second with 33 job seekers chasing every single vacancy.

The UK cities were ranked by comparing the total number of live local job vacancies in job site's comprehensive search index to the number of Jobseekers' Allowance claimants in each city according to the ONS data released last week. The results reveal a huge variation in prospects for job seekers across the country.

Region divide

The data demonstrates a clear north-south divide around the national average of 4 claimants per job ad. Six of the hardest ten cities to find a job are in the North of England, while Southend in Essex is the worst place to find a job in the South with 25 claimants per job.

Motherwell, Swansea and Belfast all figure prominently, topping the list for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland respectively.

Employment hotshots

University towns and southern English cities dominate the employment hotspots. Cambridge is an applicant's dream with just 1.3 job seekers for every available job, while Reading, Oxford & London all have less than 2.5 job seekers per vacancy. Aberdeen at 1.6 comes a surprising second to Cambridge, with oil and gas industry jobs very much to the fore.

Andrew Hunter, Co-Founder of Adzuna, said: "The data is clear - if you live in an employment blackspot like Hull where there aren't many jobs to go round, you've got to be ready to move to find work  For new graduates coming in to this market, looking for work down south or in a few other regional hotspots looks like the smart option."