The number of people on the Live Register rose last month to its highest level so far this year, according to seasonally adjusted figures from the Central Statistics Office.
The increase of 2,600 brought the total to 443,400. The monthly rise was the biggest since August last year. The unemployment rate in May crept up to 14.8% from 14.7% in April.
Men accounted for 2,200 of the monthly increase. The headline figure, which does not take seasonal factors into account, rose by 1,300 to 440,947.
The Live Register includes some part-time and seasonal workers and does not measure unemployment.
The CSO said that there were 35,515 new claimants on the Live Register last month, down from 41,996 in April. This figure is not the same as the monthly change in the Live Register, which is affected by people closing claims and moving between different schemes.
The number of people signing on for more than a year, however, rose by 6,900 last month. The number of long-term claimants has risen by almost 40% over the past 12 months. Long-term claimants now make up 40% of the total number of people on the Live Register.
The number of Irish nationals on the Live Register has increased by 4,416 (1.1%) over the past 12 months, but the number of non-Irish people signing on has fallen by 1,091 (1.4%).
Meanwhile, figures from the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Innovation show that the department was informed of 4,117 redundancies in May.
This was an increase from the April figure of 3,768 but was lower that the 4,967 redundancies seen in May 2010.
Figures disappoint economists
Bloxham economist Alan McQuaid described the figures as 'disappointing', adding that it was likely to be late 2011 at the earliest before there was an underlying improvement in employment conditions.
'Whether or not the unemployment rate hits the 15% mark this year is now very close to call, but if it doesn't it will be mainly due to increased emigration and more people staying on in education rather than a real underlying improvement in employment conditions,' he added.
Ulster Bank economist Lynsey Clemenger said the figures showed that the labour market was still 'extremely weak'.
She also expressed concern about the increasingly large proportion of total claimants who were long-term unemployed, pointing out that this figure hit a recession high of more than 176,300 last month.
'While labour market activation measures targeting the long-term unemployed were a feature of the Government's recent jobs initiative, today's numbers highlight the extent of the problem in this area,' she said.
