Unemployment on Merseyside fell slightly last month, offering some hope for the region after the economic damage of lockdown.
Almost 70,000 Merseyside residents, 7.8% of the population, were claiming unemployment benefits in June, down from 71,120 the month before.
St Helens and Knowsley have seen the biggest reductions in unemployment, with the number of people claiming benefits falling by 3.5% and 2.6% respectively, compared with May.
In Liverpool itself, unemployment fell by just under 1% while in Sefton and Wirral it fell by around 2%.
Halton, part of the wider Liverpool City Region, also saw joblessness fall slightly last month.
But despite this slight improvement, the unemployment rate is still 90% higher than it was at the start of the year and economists fear the worst is yet to come as the government-backed furlough scheme rolls down in October.
Nye Cominetti, senior economist at the Resolution Foundation think tank, said: “The easing of restrictions in May and June appears to be levelling off this stage of the labour market crisis.
"Hours worked and vacancy rates recovered slightly from record falls, and some workers returned to work from furlough.
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“But while the initial shock is levelling off, that doesn’t mean the jobs market is in recovery. The next big test of this crisis – on rising redundancies and unemployment – is still to come as the furlough scheme that has supported over nine million jobs is phased out.”
The Office for Budgetary Responsibility, the government’s independent budget watchdog, said in its latest forecast that between 10% and 20% of people currently on furlough could be made redundant after October.
That would mean between 17,300 and 34,600 more people across Merseyside losing their jobs by the end of the year.
This would push unemployment in the region over 10% and could mean more than 100,000 people claiming unemployment benefit.
