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Unemployment falls by 82,000

Unemployment fell by 82,000 between August and October to 2.51 million, official figures showed today.

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Cameron: 'There is more to do' on jobless rate

Prime Minister David Cameron told MPs:

Obviously there is no room for complacency - there are still far too many people who are long-term unemployed.

But in these figures we can see 40,000 more people in work, vacancies are up, unemployment is down by 82,000, the claimant count is down.

Over a million extra private sector jobs under this Government.

He said there was clearly "more to do" through the Government's criticised Work Programme system to deal with "stubbornly high" long-term jobless rates.

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Federation of Small Businesses: 'Labour market is inching in the right direction'

It is good news that the labour market is inching in the right direction and that youth unemployment is falling. However, latest forecasts from the Office for Budget Responsibility suggest that unemployment will peak at 8.2% which may mean further job losses in the medium term.

Small firms are key to hiring the economically inactive - an area in which unemployment rose by 60,000. Small firms that want to expand and take on more staff need an extra incentive. Extending the national insurance contributions holiday to all micro firms across the whole of the UK would be a good starting point. This would help to create an additional 45,000 jobs while adding £1.3 billion to GDP.

– John Walker, chairman of the Federation of Small Businesses

'After speeding like Bolt the Olympic jobs boost has slowed'

The rate of UK private sector job growth, having achieved a pace in the summer that Usain Bolt would have admired, has slowed considerably following the Olympics boost.

However, there were easily enough new private sector jobs to offset continued public sector job cuts, allowing a further fall in unemployment, and more of the new jobs in the latest quarter are full-time posts with permanent contracts.

So while the pace of job creation has slowed it looks as though underemployment, and thus the overall shortage of work, has fallen slightly.

Moreover, more full-time jobs for employees appear to be encouraging more self-employed people to seek employers rather than go it alone.

– Dr John Philpott, director of The Jobs Economist

Unemployment figures in detail

The number of those classed as economically inactive, including those looking after a family, on long-term sick leave or who have given up trying to find a job, increased by 60,000 to 9.07 million.

The number of unemployed women fell by 21,000 to 1.08 million compared with a fall of 61,000 among men.

A total of 449,000 people have been out of work for more than two years, up by 6,000, while 904,000 have been jobless for more than a year, unchanged from the previous quarter.

Private sector employment rose by 65,000 in the latest quarter to 23.8 million, the highest on record.

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Small rise in youth unemployment

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) has said that youth unemployment rose marginally in the third quarter of 2012, with the employment rate for those aged from 16 to 64 was 71.2%, up 0.1 on May to July 2012 and up 0.9 on a year earlier.

The ONS said there were 29.60 million people in employment aged 16 and over, up 40,000 on May to July 2012 and up 499,000 on a year earlier.

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