NI suffered highest redundancies since 2001 - but employment levels rose over past three months

The labour market statistics were published today by the Northern Ireland Statistics & Research Agency (NISRA).It found that 10,650 collective redundancies were proposed by employers in the twelve months to the end of February, more than double the number in the previous twelve months, which was only 4,390.

During February, 420 redundancies were confirmed, taking the annual total to 5,770, the highest since 2001.The number of employees receiving pay through HM Revenue and Customs PAYE (Pay As You Earn Tax) in NI in January 2021 was 744,300, a decrease of 0.9% over the previous year - but showing some signs of recovery with an increase of 0.2% since December. The flash estimate for Febuary 2021 also shows an increase of 0.2% on January’s figure, rising to 746,100.The latest seasonally adjusted unemployment rate for November-January in Northern Ireland was 3.7%, a decrease of 1.3% over the past year. A NISRA spokesperson said: “One year on since the COVID-19 pandemic began the latest labour market data show that employment levels - which include furloughed jobs - remain below pre-covid levels, while measures of unemployment remain above pre-covid levels. 

“Although some recovery has been seen since the second quarter of the year, in terms of hours worked, number of unemployment related benefit claimants and decrease in collective redundancy proposals, the scale of the recovery is less than the size of the initial shift in indicators.”The HMRC payroll data is the most timely and best single, overall indicator of the labour market, NISRA said; The latest data shows that the number of paid employees has increased in the most recent three months after remaining relatively constant between April and November. However, the number of employees in February remains 1.0% below the March 2020 total.”

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