Monthly Seasonally Adjusted Live Register increases by 1,200

9 May 2006

The April seasonally adjusted Live Register increased by 1,200 people since March. In the last year the Live Register has increased by almost 3,000. The annual increases have been spread across regions, including Dublin, the Midlands, the South-East, Mid-East and South-West. In particular, the increase of over 3,000 in the past 12 months in the number of people claiming Unemployment Assistance is worrying.

“The INOU is very concerned about the level of job losses”, said the INOU General Secretary, Mr. Eric Conroy. Recent figures from the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment show that almost 100,000 people suffered redundancies in the last four calendar years. “Unfortunately, this year already looks as if there may be even more redundancies. Figures for the first four months of this year show that redundancies are running at a 12% higher rate than for this time last year,” he added.

“These losses have been masked by job creation in construction and services in recent years. The INOU is very worried that if the economy slows down that many other people will become unemployed. The Government has to be very careful that continuing pressures on the Manufacturing Industry and the economy’s over-reliance on construction doesn’t result in even higher numbers of people becoming redundant and more people signing-on.” Mr. Conroy said. “The ESRI issued a stark warning late last year that a worse case scenario could see the rate of unemployment increase to 10%. The Government needs to heed this.” Mr. Conroy added.

Policies to address unemployment and joblessness in all its manifestations need to be clearly on the table in the current social partnership talks. The INOU is actively working to ensure that the marginalised are not left behind in getting work in the second richest country in Europe1 .
1 GDP per capita purchasing power