Tommy Broughan (Dublin North East, Labour)
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Question 93: To ask the Taoiseach the levels of employment, total numbers employed at the end of the years 2008, 2009, 2010, first quarter of 2011, second quarter of 2011, third quarter of 2011 and end of 2011; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [35081/11]

Paul Kehoe (Wexford, Fine Gael)
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The Quarterly National Household Survey (QNHS) is the official source of estimates of employment in the State. The most recent figures available are for the second quarter of 2011. The data requested by the Deputy in relation to the numbers in employment and associated employment rates for the fourth quarters of 2008, 2009 and 2010 as well as the first two quarters of 2011 are presented in tables 1 and 2.

The CSO does not forecast employment levels or related indicators; therefore data for the third and fourth quarters of 2011 are not available from the CSO. Employment forecasts are however, produced by the Department of Finance and the following information has been supplied by the Department:

Quarterly Irish economic data can be very volatile and reflecting this, the Department of Finance's labour market forecasts are based on annual averages rather than quarterly figures. On this basis, the Department of Finance anticipates that employment will decline by 1.8 per cent to 1.814 million this year. These forecasts are set out in the Medium Term Fiscal Statement, which was published by the Department of Finance on November 4th, 2011.

Table 1 Persons aged 15 years and over in employment (ILO) classified by sex and quarter

Table 2 Employment rates (ILO) for persons aged 15-64 years classified by sex and quarter