South Yorkshire benefit count cut by 48 per cent since 2010

Unemployment in South Yorkshire has been slashed by around 48 per cent since 2010, new figures show.
Nigel Coleman, of Job Centre Plus is pleased after the new figures show that unemployment has fallen again. Picture: Andrew RoeNigel Coleman, of Job Centre Plus is pleased after the new figures show that unemployment has fallen again. Picture: Andrew Roe
Nigel Coleman, of Job Centre Plus is pleased after the new figures show that unemployment has fallen again. Picture: Andrew Roe

Fresh statistics from the Department for Work and Pensions show 22,465 South Yorkshire folk are claiming out of work benefits in 2016 compared to 42,817 in 2010.

But South Yorkshire still lags behind the English average of the number of people in work.

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Only the North East and the West Midlands have fewer people in employment.

After a drop in 2014-2015, the claimant count in Sheffield went up from December. At the end of 2015, 9,050 were out of work. This rose to 9,250 in May, 2016.

Doncaster has seen a 49 per cent reduction in people claiming job seekers’ allowance since 2010 and nearly 1,000 more people are in work then they were last year.

Nigel Coleman, employer account manager at Sheffield’s Cavendish Court job centre, said: “These new figures are really encouraging - we’re increasingly busy at the job centre and we’re seeing plenty of employment opportunities.

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“We have some exciting roles coming up at the new Ikea development which will have a huge number of roles, becoming a major player in the region’s jobs market.

“A new drive-thru McDonald’s in Bentley has 65 jobs on offer and applications are being accepted right now.”

The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, Stephen Crabb, said: “This is another record-breaking set of figures, with the unemployment rate at the lowest in a decade at 5.1 per cent.

“There is good news in Yorkshire and the Humber, where the number of people in work has risen around 130,000 since 2010.”