Unemployment trebled under Cowen, says FG

UNEMPLOYMENT has almost trebled under Brian Cowen’s watch, Fine Gael said last night after Government backbenchers told the Taoiseach that the jobs crisis must be tackled.

Jobs was the main theme of the Fianna Fáil parliamentary party conference in Galway yesterday but they failed to announce any new measures to curb the spiral of unemployment which has now reached 460,000.

Enterprise Minister Batt O’Keeffe, admitted “we need to do more” but that “things are changing”.