QLD unemployment rate increases to 6.2%

The Australian Bureau of Statistics showed that the unemployment rate in Queensland rises to 6.2 percent in December, when the state lost almost 14,000 jobs during the month. However, Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has a positive outlook that the job creations of her government would offset the unemployment rate.

Palaszczuk said that the Works for Queensland program is one of the many initiatives of the government in reducing jobless rate. Premier Jackie Trad promoted the $200 million program in Townsville saying that she wanted to see an unemployment rate with a five in it. Trad said that they are 100 percent committed to making sure that people get work in the state.

However, Shadow Treasurer Scott Emerson said presenting Queensland jobseekers the figures released by the government as great figures are almost equivalent to slapping their face. He challenged the government to tell the figures to 13,000 people who lost their job in December.

Meanwhile, the report released that South Australia's unemployment rate fell from seven percent to 6.8 percent which is the country's highest unemployment rate. The rate is equivalent to 59,000 unemployed people. The state with the second-highest unemployment rate is Western Australia with 6.6 percent.

SA was reported to have created 7,900 jobs in the first 11 months of 2016. However, there were only 2,700 positions categorised as full-time. The number has failed to keep up with the increasing number of jobseekers. The rate of underemployed in SA is 10.6 percent. The underemployed were those workers who want more work hours. Currently, an extra 500 jobs were created in SA in the lead-up to Christmas. However, it remained to have the highest unemployment rate.

According to the statistics report, the number of unemployed persons in the country increased by 3,200. It also measured the number of people in work or looking for jobs which remained 64.6 percent.