Rise in borough’s monthly jobless total

FIGURES released on Wednesday show that the number of people out of work in Ballymena has increased in the past month by 58 claimants.

As of February, the jobless total for the borough stands at 1,682 of which the vast majority are men.

Broken down into wards, Ballee had the highest jobless total of 123 (up by five), closely followed by Ballykeel with 121 (up by nine). Dunclug was third highest on 120 (an increase of one on the previous month).

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The ward with the least unemployment as of February this year was Ballyloughan on 29 (down one claimant from the previous month).

The latest figures also showed that unemployment is on the rise province-wide.

The number of people claiming unemployment benefit increased by 200 last month to 61,400, the highest level since July 1997.

According to the latest quarterly employment survey (QES), which looks at how many jobs there are, said there were 694,420 employee jobs in December, a fall of just over 3,000 over the quarter and just over 7,500 annually.

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There were substantial job losses in the services sector, which shed 2,800 posts, while 940 jobs went in construction.

In the three months to December, there were 980 jobs lost in the public sector compared to private sector losses of 2,220 jobs.

There was, however, good news as manufacturing - including food, engineering and pharmaceuticals - enjoyed its third successive quarter of growth and gained just over 700 jobs.

Enterprise Minister Arlene Foster said the growth demonstrated “the resilience of the sector” and the advantages of focusing on exports.

She welcomed the fall in the unemployment rate but said the increase in claimant count highlighted “continued pressures on the labour market”.

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