Redundancy figures up a staggering 47.5%

2 May 2008

Today the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment released the redundancy figures for April 2008. For the month itself the increase was 3,179, which is up an astonishing 47.5% on April 2007. While the figure for the period January to April 2008 is 11,118, which represents an increase of 27.3%.

If this rise continues then redundancy figures are heading for an all time high and could be well into 30,000 plus range by the end of the year. Given most economic commentators are predicting little or no employment growth in 2008 the forecasts for unemployment are looking bleak. As Bríd O'Brien, Senior Policy Officer with the organisation noted, "At this stage the INOU believes unemployment will head over 6% mark in 2008".

Three sectors account for over 80% of the redundancy figures: other services which accounts for 38% of the redundancies this month and which is split 50/50 between men and women. The other two sectors are 'other manufacturing' and 'building and civil engineering'. The gender breakdown is different here with 1/3 divide between women and men on the year-to-date in 'other manufacturing' while in 'building and civil engineering' over 90% of the redundancies are male.

Again the challenge facing the Government is how to ensure that people who are made redundant are supported to find if necessary alternative employment; and if required facilitated to development their skills to make this transition. The timing involved is crucial, as it would appear to be more beneficial to encourage participation while people are still in employment yet many employers are reluctant to facilitate such engagement by their employees.