North East Unemployment Highest In The Country

20 June 2012, 09:40 | Updated: 30 March 2016, 13:50

The latest unemployment stats are out - and the North East has the highest percentage of people out of work than anywhere else in England.

The number of people unemployed in the region between February and April 2012 has gone up by 8,000, which means 145,000 people are now jobless in the North East.

11.3% of people don't have a job in the North East, so compared to the rest of the country more people aren't working here than anywhere else.

Year on year the number of people who are unemployed in the region is up 27,000 (up 22.9%)

Nationally there's better news. As a whole, unemployment has gone down in the UK by 51,000 to 2.61 million.

But the number of people claiming jobseeker's allowance in May rose by just over 8-thousand to 1.6 million, ending two months of declines.