Slight rise in Ballymena’s jobless total

According to the latest figures from the Department of Enterprise, the claimant count in the borough now stands at 1845, compared to 1809 (January).

Wards within the borough registering the most claimant counts for unemployment were Dunclug (134), Ballee (133) and Castle Demesne (123).

The area with the lowest claimant count in February was Ballyloughan (34).

Kells saw the biggest jump, rising to 71 people registered out of work in February from 58 the previous month. In Northern Ireland as a whole figure showed that the unemployment rate has hit 8.5% for the first time in 15 years.

Meanwhile, the number of people unemployed in Northern Ireland for one year or more has increased significantly to 58.6%. This is up 15.8 percentage points from one year ago. The jobless rate for the age group ‘18-24 year olds’ stands at 23.8% - the highest level since the quarterly statistics began in 1995.