THE NUMBER of people out of work in the North soared by 6,000 in the three months to May to hit a new high of 59,000 latest government figures have shown.
The rise in the jobless total in Northern Ireland is in sharp contrast to the general trend in Britain where unemployment fell by 34,000 to 2.47 million in the last quarter.
The latest figures show the number of people claiming jobless benefits in the North has also risen.
According to British government statistics a further 600 people applied for unemployment assistance in June bringing the official claimant count to 56,100.
The number of people claiming benefits in Britain in general fell for the fifth month in a row by more than 20,000 to 1.46 million.
The labour market research paints a stark picture of two very different economies; the North is deeply entrenched in a recession while Britain is showing tentative signs of a recovery. According to a report by Ulster Bank business activity in the North slumped again last month and the local economy is in no position to generate new jobs to replace those which have been lost and are under threat.
The fixed price retailer Poundland bucked the trend yesterday when it announced a further expansion in the North which could create up to 140 jobs.
Poundland, which sells all products for £1, opened its first store in Belfast last October and expects to have 20 by the close of this year.
But modest job creation targets such as these barely leave a dent on the unemployment issues facing Northern Ireland at this time.
The North’s Minister for Enterprise, Arlene Foster, described the latest local labour market figures as “disappointing”.
The statistics show that 40.9 per cent of those who are currently unemployed have been unemployed for one year or more.
But are there some glimmers of hope contained in the latest figures which suggest there has been an increase in the number of people in work in the North.
The number of persons in employment in the three months to May was estimated to be 776,000.
This represented increases of 2,000 over the quarter and 29,000 over the year.
There has also been a drop of 5,000 in the number of people registered as “economically inactive” in Northern Ireland.
These are people such as students, retired people or sick and disabled, who are not actively looking for a job.
The overall economically inactive population in the North fell between March to May by 5,000 to 557,000.
