Cowen 'disappointed' by jobless figures

Taoiseach Brian Cowen today described the latest Live Register figures as "disappointing" but denied suggestions the Government was doing nothing about the unemployment situation.

Speaking during leaders' questions in the Dáil this morning, Mr Cowen said seasonal factors meant there was a rise in Live Register figures every year in June "without exception".

The number of people receiving unemployment benefits rose by 5,800 in June, according to the latest figures released by the Central Statistics Office. The latest increase brings the seasonally adjusted total number of people signing on the Live Register to 444,900, the highest amount in three years.

"The increase this year is considerably less than last year, which was up more than 21,000. The overall figures include over 63,000 people who are working part-time and over 23,000 people who are signing on to claim credits," said Mr Cowen.

The Taoiseach said participation in the Back to Education Allowance scheme had doubled this year and that 5,600 of the additional 5,800 who joined the Live Register in June were on that scheme. The scheme will resume in September after the summer break.

Labour Party leader Eamon Gilmore pointed out that 300,000 more people are now on the Live Register than were when the last general election took place in 2007. He added that this figure did not include non-Irish nationals who had returned home and those who had emigrated abroad.

"The biggest crisis this country is facing at the moment is the level of unemployment...it is impacting on the levels of poverty that these households are experiencing and it is impacting on the self-esteem and morale of the individuals who are out of work," said Mr Gilmore.

The Labour leader accused the Government of not taking the issue of unemployment seriously. "We are in a situation now where increased numbers of people are out of work, no active measures are being taken by the Government to get people back to work and there's very little being done to get them back to education and training either," he said.

The Taoiseach insisted the Government was working to create more jobs but said the only way to do this was by ensuring the economy was more competitive.

"Jobs will not be created in a vacuum, they will not be created on the basis of letting our public finances go out of control. They certainly won't be created by the contention that we shouldn't try and repair the banking system, which is fundamental," he said.

"All actions of Government are about making sure growth spars the economy and in the second half of this year it is confidently being predicted that it will. This is going to be a difficult and hard road back to recovery. We know that. We want to get back on that road as quickly as possible and the difficult decisions we are taking have to be taken and are absolutely necessary," he added.

Mr Cowen also insisted the Government was doing all it could to help unemployed people upskill, saying the number of training places made available had more than doubled since 2008.

Separately, Fine Gael's enterprise spokesman Leo Varadkar claimed Ireland was "in a lost decade of stagnation under the current Government."

"Ireland is not working," he said. "Almost 15,000 people joined the live register in the last month, or roughly one every two and a half minutes."

"The Government has fallen into the trap of believing that a jobless recovery is good news for the economy. But a small increase in national output is no good to anyone if it doesn't make any inroads into Ireland's massive unemployment levels."