The number of people out of work in Ireland fell during October this year by one percentage point, official figures show.

Data from the Irish Central Statistics Office (CSO) show that the rate of unemployment fell from 13.7 per cent in September to 13.6 per cent last month.

There was a decline of 6,600 in the number of people without jobs in October 2010 following a 5,400 fall in September.

According to the CSO, this the first run of two consecutive monthly declines in unemployment since early 2007, with a total of 429,553 individuals now out of work, up 4.2 per cent year-on-year.

The annual increase in joblessness for the 12 months to September 2010 was 5.4 per cent, as the number of people out of work starts to slip back.

Meanwhile, redundancies declined during October 2010 by 40 per cent year-on-year to 3,910, Batt O'Keeffe, Ireland's minister for enterprise, trade and innovation, has revealed.

Posted by Alex Donnell