Partner Article

North West registers biggest fall in jobless totals

The number of people claiming the main unemployment benefit - Jobseeker’s Allowance - has now dropped below 1 million, and unemployment has seen the largest annual fall in a quarter of a century, figures published by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show.

In the North West, the number of people claiming the benefit has dropped by 63,000 over the past year. 71,000 more people are now in employment in the region, compared with this time last year.

Secretary of State for Work and Pensions Iain Duncan Smith said: “Creating jobs is central to building a stronger, more resilient and stable economy. With millions more people in private sector employment under this Government, it is clear that our long-term plan is helping Britain to recover its confidence following one of the deepest recessions in living memory.

“All of our reforms are focussed on helping people off benefits and into work – giving people the peace of mind and security that comes with a steady income.

“With the North West seeing the highest fall in unemployment over the last three months of all the UK regions - down 27,000 to 239,000 - we are helping people to break free from welfare dependency, look after themselves and their families, and play their part in getting our country back to work.”

The ONS figures also show that, nationally, the employment rate for young people who have left full-time education is 71.5% - which is up 4.3 points since 2010.

Over the last year, youth employment in the UK has grown faster than the OECD average. In the 3 months to March 2014, the UK saw the fastest fall in youth unemployment out of the G7.

84% of 16-24 year olds are now in full-time study or work – up from 81% in 2010 – which brings down the number of unemployed young people not in full-time education to 489,000.

There are also record numbers of women in work with the UK having seen the fastest growth in the number of women in work in the last year out of all G7 economies.

Nearly 40% of the annual rise in female employment was in managers, senior officials or professional occupations. Of those women working part-time, nearly 90% have chosen to work part-time because it suits them - for example they want to fit work around caring responsibilities or for other reasons such as being a student.

The proportion of women working part-time who want full-time work (12.4%) is falling – the latest figures saw the largest annual fall since 1999.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Simon Malia .