The latest positive labour market figures show Government policy aimed at eliminating long-term unemployment is working, the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment, Mr Martin, said today.
The Quarterly National Household Surveypublished by the Central Statistics Office (CSO) found that the level of employment in Ireland is now at a record level of almost 1.9 million, an increase of 57,200 or 3.1 per cent in the year.
Mr Martin said: "This Government is well on its way to achieving its ambition to effectively eliminate long-term unemployment, which is continuing to fall. These very positive figures clearly show that current Government policies are working extremely well and we will continue with the thrust of this successful approach."
"Ireland continues to perform exceptionally well in comparison with our European partners with employment and labour force growth being ahead of the EU average by a factor of three or four and with one of the lowest rates of unemployment in the EU and being considerably lower than that in the larger European states.
"The figures show a continuing strong performance in employment terms with the number of jobs in Ireland growing by more than 1,000 per week in the year to the end of September. This is an increase of 3 per cent, compared with last year, and is the strongest economic growth since 2001," Minister Martin concluded.
The latest survey, which is widely accepted as the most accurate gauge of the labour market, also found that Ireland's unemployment rate fell to 4.4 per cent in the third quarter as the rate of job creation grew at the fastest rate since 2001 to compensate for job losses.
There were 93,900 persons unemployed in the third quarter, representing a decrease of 4,900 in the year. The seasonally adjusted unemployment figure stood at 86,600, representing a decrease of 1,500 in the quarter. The seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 4.4per cent .
The growth in employment is the highest level of annual growth recorded since the 3.8 per cent recorded in the first quarter of 2001. Increases in the numbers in full-time employment accounted for almost 90 per cent of the annual change.
The numbers employed in the construction sector continue to surge ahead with an annual increase of 21,600 to the third quarter of 2004. Employment in financial services (+12,500), Other services (+13,100), Wholesale and retail trade (+9,200) and Health (+8,300) also showed strong growth in the year.
Employment in the year fell in four sectors with the largest annual decreases recorded in hotels and restaurants (7,600) and Other production industries (2,100).
Economists said that the survey results suggest that the growth momentum witnessed over the past year is set to continue into another impressive year in 2005.
Mr Dermot O'Leary, economist at Goodbody stockbrokers, noted the improvement in the quality of employment with over 88 per cent of the increase in employment over the past year being accounted for by full-time employment.
Encouragingly 83 per cent of employment growth has come from the private sector, signifying the increased confidence in economic activity in the country, he said.
Bank of Ireland's chief economist, Dr Dan McLaughlin, said the growth in employment supported the view that Celtic Tiger 2 was alive and kicking.
Dr McLaughlin said the Irish economy can grow by 6.5 per cent a year over the medium term, generating 55,000 jobs per annum.
"The consensus view sees this as too high, and most analysts think in terms of 5% GDP growth but we would argue that this understates the likely growth in the labour force and hence employment growth."
He added that the figures imply a much stronger growth in disposable income than most analysts had pencilled in, particularly as wage growth has clearly accelerated as well.
Personal consumption growth has been sluggish this year despite this build-up in spending power which points to a stronger rise in the savings ratio and augurs well for both the Christmas shopping season and the economy in 2005, Dr McLaughlin concluded.