THE NUMBER OF people signing onto the Live Register fell by 3,200 in July bringing the seasonally adjusted number of people signing on to 419,200.

According to new figures released today by the Central Statistics Office (CSO), unadjusted figures showed that there were 441, 976 people singing on in July 2013 representing a fall of 18, 347 on last year.

Seasonal adjustment of the figures is a statistical method of removing certain seasonal events and trends which would cause a swing in statistics. The seasonally adjusted figure provides a better indication of the overall trend of people signing on the Live Register.

The Live Register is not designed as a measure of unemployment but today’s CSO  figures translate to a standardised unemployment rate  of 13.5 per cent, down from 13.6 per cent in June.

An age breakdown of the figures shows that the percentage of persons aged under 25 on the Live Register remains above the average at 16.4 per cent but down on the July 2012 figure of  17.5 per cent and the July 2011 figure of 19.0 per cent.

There is significant gender variation in the trend of those unemployed for a year or more. The number of long term claimants  was 197,571 in July with the number of male long term claimants decreasing by 5,238 in the year to July 2013 while females increased by 2,723.

The fall in numbers signing on was welcomed by the Small Firms Association but acting director Avine McNally says that the figures are strongly influenced by emigration and that tackling long-term unemployment is a difficult task:

The task the Government faces in re-skilling and retraining the long term unemployed is daunting, but necessary, if Ireland is to further improve the quality of our workforce and avoid a long period of structural unemployment.

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