Only 17% of new welfare recipients back to work in 6 months

OF the 155,000 people who joined the Live Register in the first quarter of last year, only a sixth started the second half of the year in a new job, figures from the Central Statistics Office show.

And of the 27,308 people who did manage to get work by the middle of 2009, just under a half were forced to turn to a different industry.

The CSO figures show 59.1% of those who joined the Live Register in the first quarter of last year were still on it by the end of June, a further 4% were receiving social welfare illness payments and only 0.3% were drawing a pension.