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The need for IT support in companies has continued to slide, according to a report by an employment organisation.

IT Pro highlighted the survey taken out by the Recruitment and Employment Confederation and KPMG which has found that demand for full-time IT employees is shrinking.

The scale, based around the number 50 which denotes a middle point - with a figure below 50 showing a lower requirement and anything above 50 showing a growing need - indicated that the amount of vacancies during the month of August showed a drop to 48.0.

Although this is very slightly better than July, which chalked up 48.1, it is down on the 12-month total, when August 2007 received a rating of 59.9.

However, the report highlighted that CNC programmers were still in short supply, with IT and computing accounting for the third-most popular job type in the country.

Yesterday, a report for Computing noted that a job in IT was a good thing to have, even though nobody in a recent straw poll of 16 to 18-year-olds was considering a career in the trade.

More than half of small businesses (53%) believe that the most important benefit of outsourcing is guaranteed response times for IT support, London based Connect conducted the research in 2007.