British unemployment has fallen and a record number of people are in work, new figures showed today.
The number of people looking for a job fell by 23,000 in the three months to December to 1.69 million, while there was a cut in those claiming Jobseeker's Allowance.
The so-called claimant count fell by 13,500 in January to 925,800, the sixth time the figure has fallen in the past seven months.
Meanwhile, the number of people in work increased by 51,000 over the latest quarter to 29.04 million, the highest total since records began in 1971.
But the good news was tempered by an increase in the number of people classed as economically inactive, including students, people taking early retirement, looking after a relative or just not seeking work.
That figure increased by 19,000 to 7.85 million or 21 per cent of the working age population, the worst figure for almost a year.
The number of manufacturing jobs also continued to fall, down by 63,000 in the three months to December compared with a year earlier, to just over three million, the lowest on record.
The fall in the claimant count was the biggest since May 2004 and the monthly reduction was the biggest in almost a year.
Other data from the Office for National Statistics today showed there were almost 608,000 job vacancies in the UK economy in the three months to January, up by more than 7,000 from the previous three months.
Average earnings increased by 4 per cent in the year to December, down by 0.1 per cent compared with the previous month. Wage growth in private firms fell by 0.2 per cent to 4.1 per cent compared with an unchanged figure of 3.2 per cent in the public sector.
There were 9,000 days lost through industrial action in December, the lowest monthly total since last August, taking the annual figure to 749,000.
The UK's 5.4% unemployment rate is one of the lowest in Europe, but is higher than Ireland's at 4.4 per cent and Denmark's at 3.2 per cent.