Concern at youth jobless figures

Downward unemployed figures are masking a rise in youth joblessness that should prompt Government action, says the National Youth Council of Ireland.

Central Statistics Office (CSO) data showed a fall in headline unemployment, staying below 10% in July, at a 9.7% rate that compares favourably to 11.2% a year earlier.

However, when figures are adjusted for seasonal patterns, they show 208,900 people were unemployed, up 300 since June but 32,400 fewer than in July 2014.

The positive news emerged as an international recruitment consultancy reported a 19% annual growth in the number of jobs being advertised here, with above-average growth in human resources, secretarial and support jobs offered.

But for those aged under 25, the NYCI said, the CSO figures show 37,600 or 20.2% were unemployed. Although down from almost 27% two years ago, it had dropped below 20% last month and council deputy director James Doorley said unemployment remains more than double pre-crisis rates of 8% to 9%.

The youth unemployment figure represents a slight increase of 700 since June, meaning it was behind the seasonally adjusted overall increase, with 300 fewer people unemployed across all other age groups.

“Moreover, the latest figures at the end of June show that almost 19,000 young people were on the Live Register for one year or more,” Mr Doorley said.

The NYCI has called on the Government to restore the adult rate of €188 a week for all young people in education, training and work experience programmes. The training allowance for young people on a range of schemes has been cut to €160 a week by the current and previous governments.

Mr Doorley said the justification for cuts to various welfare payments for people aged under 26 was partly on the basis that it would incentivise young people to take the additional education, training and work opportunities it provided.

But he said this policy was short-sighted and had been further undermined by decisions to cut training allowances.

“The estimated €19m cost of our proposal is modest in the overall budgetary arithmetic, however the social and economic benefits of the proposal for young jobseekers and Irish society are significant,” he said.

The Robert Walters job market report showed only Spain had higher annual growth in the number of jobs advertised. It said employee numbers are growing in support functions, particularly within financial services, technology and private law firms.

But there was also high demand for multilingual customer services professionals due to the volume of shared services and customer support centres here.

The CSO figures might read slightly better but for the addition of around 2,800 people previously receiving the One-Parent Family Payment who made a claim for jobseekers’ allowance last month.

Recipients of the one-parent family payment are not counted as part of the Live Register, but changes to qualifying ages have seen some move to other welfare schemes, having a marginal effect each July since 2013.