The country's job market has bounced back big time in May and according to the latest Advantage Job Index, full-time hiring surged by 5.47 percent last month as compared to the 1.74 percent decline suffered in April following three straight months of job growth at the start of 2010.

Formerly known as the Olivier Job Index, the fresh figures showed that business confidence has been fast gaining with the national job market increasing by 19.92 percent coming from May 2009 as office jobs led the pick ups in available job slots.

The Advantage Professional said that the job growth numbers posted in May has been the biggest this year in spite of the consecutive rise in cash rates and the uncertainty that followed the release of the Henry tax review and federal budget.

Advantage Resourcing director of global market intelligence Robert Olivier said that the prospect of project delays coming from the planned resource super profits tax seemed to have caused only minor worries for mining-sector workers as demand for labour in all areas of the resources industry remained very high.

He said that projects to be cancelled or delayed could actually balance the job market and with the present skills shortages, "this would be welcomed by other mining and resources companies who are keen to pick up available talent."

The same figures showed that online job ads for the engineering and mining industry improved by 10.54 percent in May with the building and construction sectors and the legal profession posting online job ads increases of 8.96 percent and 7.84 percent respectively.

On the other hand, full-time positions offered in the same month jumped by 5.1 percent as it pulled up part-time job slots too by 2.1 percent while contractual employment increased up to 9.1 percent.

Mr Olivier said that the spike in full-time hiring should indicate that business confidence is steadily growing in Australia as he noted that part-time employment or underemployment only increased last year as more companies instituted cost-saving measures that would cut down salary budget and avoid or minimise retrenchments.

He expressed confidence that companies are now looking forward to team expansions in preparation for the upcoming financial year.