Recent figures have shown a drop in the number of unemployed people in the UK. Unemployment figures have dropped by forty five thousand.

The Office for National Statistics reported that the figure for unemployment was now at 8.2 per cent.

There was good news for young people whose unemployment figure fell by seventeen thousand to 1.02 million. However, the number of people who had been unemployed in the long term, that is for a period in excess of a year, was the highest it has been since 1996. This figure is at eight hundred and eighty seven thousand, that's an increase of twenty seven thousand.

Accordingly, the number of people claiming job seekers allowance has dropped by over thirteen thousand. This in turn will hopefully lead to greater spending in general, which will have a positive effect on the economy. Of those now in employment a large percentage have started working part time. Often, it is the case that people prefer a full time job but have had to settle for part time hours nonetheless. Those people working part-time because they couldn't find a full-time job was at the highest since records began in 1992 at 1.42 million. This was an increase of 73,000 on the previous quarter. The ONS said the total number of part time workers was 7.99 million between January and March, that there was an increase of 118,000 compared with the previous three-month period between October and December.

Unfortunately the figures were better for some than others with men making more of an improvement than women. In fact, of the forty five thousand drop in unemployed individuals, forty two thousand of them were men, that equates to 95.6 per cent. Brendan Barber of the TUC also pointed out the effects of the reduction in real wages and the rise in part time-work. He said "the falling number of full-time jobs and the 6% fall in real wages over the last two years means that people are having to make huge salary sacrifices and put their careers on hold just to stay in work." The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), which monitors the labour market, had a more positive view commenting that the fall in joblessness was "remarkable" since the UK economy had just fallen back into recession.