The 11,000 increase in the number of people on the live register was described as "alarming" by Labour Party leader Eamon Gilmore. Colm Keena, Public Affairs Correspondent, reports.

He called on the Government to put in place training opportunities for those who lost their jobs, and said the Government also needed to do more to facilitate the development of the indigenous hi-tech sector.

Live register figures for January were released by the Central Statistics Office yesterday as were the number of redundancies recorded by the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment for the same month.

Seasonally adjusted, the rise in the numbers on the live register in January was 7,800, and the change over the past year was 22,800. The standardised unemployment rate for January was 4.9 per cent.

Broken down into gender, the seasonally adjusted rise during January comprised 6,400 males, and 1,400 females.

Economist Deirdre Ryan of Goodbody stockbrokers said she believed the employment rate would reach 6 per cent by the year end. Ms Ryan said the large number of men added to the register is "providing further evidence of the slowdown in activity in the housebuilding sector".

She said the rise on an averaged basis in the numbers on the register over the past three years was "the fastest pace of increase over the past five years".

Rossa White of Davy stock- brokers said the live register rise reflected job losses in house building. He said the 4.4 per cent month-on-month rise was the biggest since 1980 while the rise in absolute numbers was the largest ever.

However, he pointed out that the unemployment rate was still below average for the EU, and said the losses were mainly confined to housing. "The malaise is not widespread."

Mr White said employment growth had slowed but the latest available data suggested that labour force growth had slowed in line, and this would limit the spike in unemployment this year. "We still expect a 5.5 per cent unemployment rate for year end, but the risk is on the upside."

Figures for redundancies recorded under the Redundancy Scheme by the department during January showed 737 of the 2,786 total were in the construction sector. The number in the category "other manufacturing" was 709 and the number in the "other services" category was 742.