Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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161. To ask the Minister for Social Protection the categories of payments from her Department that mean that the recipient is counted on the live register; and the number of persons in each category. [43449/13]

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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162. To ask the Minister for Social Protection the categories of payments from her Department that mean that the recipient is officially counted as unemployed; and the number of persons in each category. [43450/13]

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 161 and 162 together.

The official measure of unemployment is the figure for people unemployed reported by the Central Statistics Office in the Quarterly National Household Survey (QNHS). This figure is compiled and calculated in accordance with international standards set by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) and is directly comparable with equivalent measures in other countries. The monthly Live Register count is a separate measure of people in receipt of jobseeker payments. It contains all claimants for Jobseekers Benefit (excluding systematic short-time workers), claimants for Jobseekers Allowance (excluding smallholders and self-employed persons), and other people of working age claiming for credited social welfare contributions, but excluding those directly involved in an industrial dispute. Claims with a status of awarded or pending award are included, along with those claims which have a status of disallowed but where the client is still signing on. The Live Register count includes people who are working casually, i.e. working up to three days per week and claiming a jobseeker payment for the remainder of the week. As the Live Register figure includes casual workers and people claiming credits it typically exceeds the official QNHS measure of people unemployed.

Live Register end of September, 2013

As of the end of September 2013 there were 408,670 people on the live register. I have attached a breakdown by scheme of this number for your information. It is to be noted that 82,295 of the total number were casual and part-time workers.