MORE PEOPLE are out of work and claiming benefit in Dundee East and Kirkcaldy than almost anywhere else in Scotland, jobs figures showed yesterday.

The survey by the Government’s national statistics agency found that Kirkcaldy had 5.4% of its working age population on jobseeker’s allowance in April, a rate equalled only by Maryhill in Glasgow.

That worked out at 2061 claimants.

Dundee East was next highest on the list of Scottish Parliamentary constituencies, with a claimant rate of 4.9%. That came to 2150 people.

By comparison, the Scottish average was 2.9% and the UK average 2.6%.

Overall, the number of people in work in Scotland has continued to rise. In the three months to March, 2.543 million people had a job, up 37,000 on the same period last year.

There were 144,000 people out of work, only 2000 fewer than a year ago. Of that total 86,300 were on jobseeker’s allowance.

At just over 75%, the employment rate is now at its highest since records began, above the rest of the UK and all other European countries except Denmark, said officials.

Nationally the so-called claimant count rose by 8100 in April to 839,400, the first time it has increased for three consecutive months since early 2003.

Scots Secretary Alistair Darling said, “The continuing strengthening of the Scottish labour market is very encouraging.

“Unemployment has fallen while employment continues to hit record levels and more people than ever before are being helped into the labour market to take advantage of the opportunities available.”

Claimant count in April for other local constituencies included—Dundee West 1728 (3.8%), Angus 1357 (2.9%), Perth 950 (2.0%), North Tayside 982 (2.2%), North East Fife 760 (1.6%), Central Fife 2079 (4.5%), Dunfermline East 1634 (3.9%) and Dunfermline West 1288 (3.0%).

According to the team at Scottish Economic Research, run by Abertay University, the unemployment rate in Tayside in April was 3.1%, down 0.1% on March.

Perth and Kinross enjoyed a substantial fall in the number of people out of work over the year to April, down by 9.8%, with a more modest decline in Angus and only a slight reduction in Dundee.

The number of people aged 25-plus in Tayside who have been out of work for more than 12 months stood at 1055 last month. Some 315 people in that age group had been jobless for at least two years.

Vacancies at job centres during April were a little up on the previous month, but 17.7% down compared to a year ago.

There were 3.9 people out of work for every vacancy in the region last month, worse than the Scottish ratio of 2.7 people per vacancy.

Stewart Hosie, MP for Dundee East, called for Government action to tackle the “unacceptably high levels of unemployment” in the constituency.

Mr Hosie said, “It is vital that the Government take action to tackle this problem.

“It is a tragedy that thousands of people in Dundee want to work but there are few jobs available for them.”