Northampton's employees put in more than 48 hours a week as town is ranked 12th hardest grafting in the UK

An online tool has ranked Northampton as the 12th hardest-working town or city in the country.

The town even beat out the number one hardest-working city - Birmingham - for the number of hours worked per week on average.

Furnishing company Thomas Sanderson compiled the list by looking at average stats for the UK's towns and cities such as commute time, unemployment and total jobs per 10,000 people.

Employees in Northampton reportedly work an average of 48.8 hours a week - compared to Londoners, who put in 79 hours a week.

Northampton's motorists also drive an average of 28 minutes for their work commute.

But the town's top-scoring aspect was is its number of business start ups - coming in at 73 per 10,000 people and ranking it as 5th place for the UK.

The data does not give detail of how many businesses cease trading for comparison.

Northampton also reportedly has 9,754 jobs per 10,000 people at a time.

Conversely, nearby Milton Keynes ranked as the third hardest-working city in the country, where employees work an average of one extra hour a week.

Richard Petrie, Marketing Director at www.thomas-sanderson.co.uk, said:

“Britain is certainly a nation that knows how to work hard, so it was interesting to look at different factors associated with this to see how working varied across the nation. We spend so much of our lives at work, so it’s important to give yourself enough time to wind-down and relax when you are not there.”