Scottish unemployment rises by 11,000

The figures also showed that employment in Scotland fell by 14,000 over over the same three months, and by 29,000 over the year, to stand at 2,604,000.

The Scots employment rate fell by 0.5 p.p. over the quarter to 73.4 per cent - below the UK average of 74.5 per cent.

The Scottish unemployment rate is now 5.1 per cent, which is above the rate of 4.8 per cent for the whole of the UK, but represents a fall in Scotland’s overall unemployment rate by 0.4 percentage points over the whole of the past year.

Unemployment in Scotland rose by 11,000 over the quarter to remain down 12,000 over the year. The level now stands at 139,000.

Meanwhile, youth unemployment decreased by 3.6 percentage points over the last year to 9.4 per cent, the lowest youth unemployment rate since the series began, and below the UK. Scotland now has the 2nd lowest youth unemployment rate in the EU.

Secretary of State for Scotland, David Mundell, said: “Today’s statistics underline the need for the Scottish Government to focus all their efforts on supporting jobs and economic growth, because they paint a worrying picture.

“Whereas across the UK the news is better, here in Scotland unemployment is up, employment is down and Scotland’s economy continues to lag behind that of the UK.

“The UK Government has devolved a raft of new powers to Holyrood, agreed a fair financial settlement as a strong foundation, and delivered £800m of extra investment for the Scottish government to spend. The Scottish government now needs to use all of these powers to secure and strengthen Scotland’s economy”.

Minister for employability and training, Jamie Hepburn, said: “It is clear that the Scottish and UK economies, are currently facing challenging economic conditions nevertheless, despite a slight rise in the unemployment rate over the most recent quarter, it has fallen over the past year.

“It is also heartening to see how strongly we are performing in the youth labour market, where we see the unemployment levels among young Scots steadily declining.

“Scotland is also leading the UK in terms of the proportion of young people currently in work, which is testament to the effectiveness of our youth employment strategy, ‘Developing the Young Workforce’, and our commitment to support Modern Apprentices, providing 30,000 places by 2020.

“Despite the strong performance of the youth labour market, the Brexit vote caused significant economic uncertainty, threatening our economic recovery and the stability of our jobs market.

“Scottish Government analysis suggests that a hard Brexit could cost the Scottish economy up to £11 billion a year by 2030. Since the vote, Ministers have kept engaged with business and stakeholders to understand the challenges, mitigate their impact and ultimately protect our access to the single market as outlined in the Scottish Government paper, ‘Scotland’s Place in Europe’, published in December.

“Additionally, we have also announced a Capital Acceleration Programme, and the £500 million Scottish Growth Scheme, which is designed to provide investment guarantees, and some loans, of up to £5 million for eligible businesses.”