580 foreigners a DAY got a job in Britain last year... as the number of British-born unemployed soared

There really are "Jobs Britons won't do". The notoriously feeble British work ethic and strike-proneness make the recent trends entirely understandable. Besides, why work when you can live as well or better on welfare payments? If I were an English businessman, I wouldn't employ a whingeing Pom either

AROUND 580 foreigners landed a job in the UK every day last year while the number of British-born workers collapsed, official figures revealed today.

The Office for National Statistics said the number of British-born workers with a job crashed by 208,000 last year. But this is the exact opposite of what is happening to foreign-born workers, with numbers jumping by 212,000 last year.

Figures also revealed that women bore the brunt of the latest rise in unemployment, as figures showed today the number of female jobseekers has leapt to its highest rate in 23 years. Two thirds of the 48,000 extra unemployed in the last quarter were women, as Britain's jobless rate rose for the eighth month in a row.

More than a million women are now unemployed in this country, the highest number in nearly a quarter of a century and a rise of 91,000 over last year, according to the think tank IPPR.

Young workers have also been hit hard by unemployment, with over million aged 16-24 now jobless, and nearly 250,000 unemployed for more than a year.

The total number of those out of work in the last quarter of 2011 leapt to 2.67 million, a jobless rate of 8.4 per cent, the worst figure since the end of 1995. Numbers claiming Jobseeker's Allowance rose by 6,900 in January to 1.6 million, the 11th consecutive monthly increase.

Of the 48,000 out of work in Britain at the end of last year, up to 33,000 are women and the remaining number of over 15,000 are men.

More than 530 workers every day are losing their jobs as Britain’s unemployment crisis deepens, official figures from the Office for National Statistics revealed today. Between October and December, 48,000 people joined the swelling ranks of 2.67million unemployed people in this country.

This means around one million people have lost their job since the credit crunch struck in August 2007, and face a battle against other desperate jobseekers to find another one.

The resulting clamour for employment means there is an average of almost six people chasing each job vacancy, with record numbers forced to accept part-time work because they could not find a full-time job.

Ministers insisted there were 'encouraging signs of stability' in the labour market, but one union boss today gave a bleaker outlook, describing 'the worst employment prospects for Britons since the recession began.' Other union bosses also rounded on the Coalition in light of the rising unemployment figures

The number of women claiming the allowance increased by 1,500 last month to 531,700, the highest figure since the summer of 1995.

Reacting to the figures, Sir Andrew Green, chairman of the think-tank, Migrationwatch, described the extraordinary increase in foreign-born workers as ‘quite extraordinary’. He said: ‘Given the continued increase in the number of British workers who are unemployed, it seems quite extraordinary that some employers are still employing agencies to recruit workers from overseas.’

Recently, the Employment Minister, Chris Grayling, was asked about why one branch of the sandwich chain Pret a Manger appeared to be staffed entirely by foreigners.

He said: ‘It is certainly a situation that I find unacceptable. Of course, this country has benefitted from people coming in from other countries to work. ‘But I want to see more young people in positions in this country and I want…to see them getting jobs that become vacant, rather than people coming into the UK.’

The data also prompted anger from gender equality groups. Anna Bird, acting chief executive of the Fawcett Society, said: 'These new figures must act as a wake-up call to Government - we are in a time of crisis. 'Cuts are threatening women's equality as jobs dry up, benefits are slashed and vital public services disappear.'

A record number of people are working part-time because they cannot find full-time jobs - up by 83,000 over the latest quarter to 1.35 million.

Employment increased by 60,000 to 29 million, mainly due to a rise of 90,000 in the number of part-time employees to 6.6 million.

Other data from the Office for National Statistics showed a 22,000 increase in youth unemployment to 1.04 million, which includes 307,000 in full-time education who were looking for work. The 48,000 increase in unemployment was the smallest quarterly rise since last summer.

Economic inactivity, which includes students, long-term sick, people who have retired early or those who have given up looking for work, fell by 78,000 to 9.29 million, 23 per cent of the working age population.

Average pay increased by 2 per cent in the year to December, unchanged from the previous month, although in the public sector it fell by 0.2 per cent to 1.7 per cent, the lowest figure since records began in 2001.

There were 1.39 million days lost through industrial disputes in the year to last December, the highest figure since 2002.

Around 164,000 workers were made redundant or took voluntary redundancy in the final quarter of last year, up by 17,000 from the three months to September.

The number of job vacancies increased by 11,000 in recent months to 476,000, although this was 21,000 down on a year ago.

The Government said the figures showed that despite continuing economic challenges, the labour market was stabilising. Minister for Welfare Reform Lord Freud said: 'The latest figures show some encouraging signs of stability despite the challenging economic climate. 'With more people in employment and a rise in vacancies, it is clear the private sector is still creating jobs

'However, we are not complacent. With more people in the labour market we know that competition for those jobs is tough and we will continue to make it our priority to find people work.'

Paul Kenny, general secretary of the GMB union, said: 'Austerity means 2.67 million people are not working. 'As it is clear that austerity and deflation as a policy is not working, it is both surprising and shocking that there are so few demands from Tory backbenches, from the CBI, from the City and from the Liberal and Labour parties that the policy be abandoned in favour of sure fire ways of getting people back to work.

John Salt, of recruitment firm totaljobs.com, said: 'Britons are facing their worst employment prospects since the recession began.

The UK's negative Q4 GDP data released last month confirmed the lacklustre growth in the UK economy and this, alongside a backdrop of diminishing demand, has led to nervous employers adapting their 'wait and see' approach to the labour market to start cutting their workforces instead.

'All the more apparent is the widening gap between North and South, with depressed high streets and businesses across the North West and North East struggling to cope with the lack of demand and obstacles to securing finance hindering the North from investing in its workforces.'

TUC general secretary Brendan Barber said: 'These figures are bad, although thankfully not quite the disaster we saw at the end of last year. 'With one in three jobseekers looking for work for over a year, and around six unemployed people for every job, the Government's mantra that there are plenty of jobs out there just doesn't ring true.

'It's encouraging to see a small rise in employment, but this is entirely down to people taking part-time work because there are no full-time jobs available. 'Any job is better than no job at all, even if it's on far lower pay and shorter hours, but people cannot afford to do this indefinitely. We desperately need more full-time jobs paying decent wages.'

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