New figures from the Central Statistics Office show that the number of people signing on rose again last month.
The seasonally adjusted Live Register figure rose by 3,300 in December to stand at 426,700 from November's total of 423,400. The figure had fallen in October for the first time since March 2007, but has now risen again in the past two months. The unemployment rate was unchanged at 12.5%.
The CSO says there was an unadjusted increase in the Live Register of 46.1% in 2009 to 423,595. This compares with an increase of 70.2% in 2008. The unadjusted December figure - which does not take seasonal factors into account - was up 10,000 from November.
During 2009, the number of men signing on increased by 45.4%, while the number of women rose by 47.5%.
Figures released last night showed that 4,121 redundancies were notified to the Department of Enterprise, Trade & Employment in December, up 23% on the same month in 2008. This increase was, however, much smaller than those recorded earlier in the year.
For the whole of 2009, 77,000 lay-offs were recorded, up almost 90% from the 40,800 notified in 2008 and more than three times the figure for 2007.
Emigration helping stabilise jobless figures
NIB economist Ronnie O'Toole said there were increasing signs that the rapid deterioration in the labour market was at an end, pointing out that the unemployment rate was little changed from July.
He predicted that the jobless rate would stagnate before gradually falling over the course of 2010. He said this would not be because of an increase in employment, but due to fewer people actively participating in the labour market, as they opt for early retirement and further education.
Goodbody economist Deirdre Ryan also pointed to the little-changed unemployment rate. She added that in the final quarter of 2009, the Live Register rose by just 1,200, compared with a rise of almost 16,000 in Q3. The economist said a reduction in the labour force, and in particular increasing outward migration, had been the single biggest factor contributing to the stability in the unemployment rate.
'The fact that a number of claimants may be exhausting their benefit entitlements (unemployment assistance may only be received for one year in certain instances) and therefore are removed from the Register once this occurs is also playing a role in the moderating rate of increase, although this is difficult to quantify,' Ms Ryan added.
Davy's Rossa White also attributed the more stable figures to emigration, the fact that people who did not qualify dropped off the Live Register and a moderation in the pace of firing by companies.
He said the January and February figures would be be worth watching for what he called 'the last run of lay-offs in construction and retail'. He said this may not be quite as bad as some commentators have suggested.
Bloxham's Alan McQuaid said that, despite signs of an improvement in unemployment figures, there was no indication that employers were actually hiring more staff. 'We don't see the jobless rate deteriorating that dramatically from here, with the peak now likely to be not much higher than 13%,' he said.
But Ulster Bank's Lynsey Clemenger said the figures were a bit weaker than expected, though the underlying trend was still one of improvement.
