The number of redundancies rose 15.1 per cent year-on-year in April, with 2,162 people made redundant during the month, according to figures from the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment.

This compares with job losses of 1,879 in April 2006.

So far this year, the number of redundancies notified under the redundancy scheme is running 13 per cent ahead of the first four months of 2006, with 8,759 people losing their jobs between January and April compared to 7,752 in the same period last year.

Some 169 part-time employees were also made redundant during April.

Despite fears that a slowdown in the residential housing sector would lead to large-scale job losses, the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment's figures show that the highest number of redundancies occurred in the "other services" category, where there were 701 job losses.

The manufacturing sector suffered 667 job losses, while there were 285 redundancies in the building and civil engineering industry.

A total of 5,309 men and 3,450 women have been made redundant in 2007.