No Room For Complacency on Unemployment Figures - CTU

Statistics NZ's Household Labour Force Survey out this morning shows unemployment at 3.7 per cent, representing 82,000 workers.

"Today's figures, and recent announcements of large redundancies in some areas, mean that there is still a need for active labour market policies to assist more people into work, and support for workers made redundant to find a job as good as or better."

"21 per cent of part time workers would also like more work hours and are under utilised," he said.

"We also need an ongoing commitment to address the disparity facing Maori workers, whose unemployment rate is still much higher overall, at 7.2 per cent. The CTU supports, and is involved in, programmes directly investing in Maori workers."

"700,000 people start a new job each year and this reflects in part a churn of workers dissatisfied with pay and conditions in their current job. The CTU renews its call for decent, quality work, which includes addressing our unsatisfactory low wage rates," Ross Wilson said.