Interpretation

Proportions of people claiming are the number of claimants in a year divided by the population aged from 16 to 64 from mid-year 2023 population estimates.

The experimental Claimant Count consists of claimants of Jobseekers Allowance (JSA) and some Universal Credit (UC) Claimants. The UC claimants that are included are 1) those that were recorded as not in employment (May 2013-April 2015), and 2) those claimants of Universal Credit who are required to search for work, i.e. within the Searching for Work conditionality regime as defined by the Department for Work & Pensions (from April 2015 onwards).

The count is based on live claims on the second Thursday of the reference month.

Under certain circumstances, some people are able to claim both contribution-based JSA and UC at the same time. Consequently, there has been a small amount of double counting. Information from DWP suggests this double counting increased at the start of the pandemic and has stabilised at approximately 1.0 to 1.5% of the Claimant Count.

Northern Ireland local government districts Claimant Count figures are only available from 2013 onwards.

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The original source data for this indicator can be found on the following page: Office for National Statistics(opens in a new tab).

Information on the strengths and limitations of the Explore Local Statistics service and methods used is available in the quality and methodology information (QMI) report.

Other indicators

Claimant Count is one of 104 local indicators on the Explore local statistics service. See the full list of local indicators.