Third quarter sees jobless rise

Joblessness rose in the three months to September 2002 under the government's preferred measure. That is the International Labour Organisation (ILO) count, which includes people not eligible for benefit.

The figure rose by 45,000 to 1,541,000 compared to the previous quarter. The unemployment rate rose by 0.2 percentage points to 5.3% of the workforce. The number of unemployed men totalled 928,000 (a 5.9% rate) and 614,000 women (a 4.6% rate).

Meanwhile the claimant count fell for the fourth successive month to its lowest level since 1975. The number of people claiming benefit and out of work was down by 4,500 to 940,500 - an unemployment rate of 3.1% of the workforce.

The claimant count was higher than the UK average of 3.1% in eight of the 12 regions. Heading the list were the North East, with a 4.9% rate, and Northern Ireland, with 4.5%.

National Statistics figures also show that the number of people in work dropped by 36,000 in the quarter to September, to 27.6 million. There was a fall of 72,000 full-time workers but this was offset by an increase of 37,000 part timers.

Manufacturing shed 294,000 jobs in the third quarter compared to a year earlier and jobs totalled just 3.65 million.