UK’s firms working in service sector are giving up on attempts to hire new personnel amid falling business confidence ahead of the country’s exit from European Union, Bloomberg reports referencing to British Chamber of Commerce.

Share of firms hiring new workforce is the lowest in 25 years. And even those who is trying to do that have difficulties with finding people.

Level of export sales and orders is also the lowest since the second quarter of 2016. This can result in lowest annual economic growth in the UK since the global financial crisis.

Survey of 5600 companies also showed that in this situation they cut investments into production and service sectors. Shares of companies that want to spend money on factories, equipments or personnel training fell to the lowest in more than a year.