Weekly job losses at 490 as redundancies soar by 28%

ALMOST 500 jobs were lost on average every week during 2002 while redundancies were up 28% on the year before, the latest figures show.

Annual statistics released by the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment show 23,574 workers were made redundant this year an average of 490 lost jobs every week.

Dublin fared worst accounting for over 51% of the losses with Cork and the Mid-West suffering losses of more than 2,500 jobs each.