by business editor Trevor Sturgess

Chill winds of recession blew across the county's jobs market last month as nearly 2,000 new people joined the dole queue.

Kent - previously thought better insulated than many areas against the downturn’s icy blast - suffered from rising unemployment over the snowy Christmas and New Year period.

The jobless total for the whole county rocketed by 1,964 to 37,328, the highest it has been since May 1997.

The Medway figure went up by 356 to 7,659 (4.8 per cent), while the number on Jobseekers' Allowance in the rest of Kent soared by 1,608 to 29,669 (3.5 per cent).

It was the same grim picture countywide, with treble-digit rises in all but three of Kent’s 12 districts. The usual east-west divide seen in recent months, with unemployment soaring in the east and holding reasonably steady in the west, did not apply.

More prosperous areas such as Tunbridge Wells, Sevenoaks, Tonbridge and Malling, Maidstone and Canterbury all shared the pain.

Kent bucked the national quarterly trend which saw unemployment fall by 3,000 to 2.46million (7.8 per cent) in the three months to December, defying predictions that the total would smash through the 2.5million barrier. But that figure is still 448,000 higher than a year earlier.

Kent’s increase was more in line with the claimant count which rose by 23,500 to 1.64million, 381,800 higher than a year ago.

The public sector workforce went up to 6.09million in September, up 23,000 from June. The private sector saw job numbers rise by 15,000 over the same period to 22.82million. The average weekly pay packet - including bonuses - in the public sector was £457, a shade higher than the £448 in the private sector.

The number of people unemployed for more than 12 months increased by 37,000 to 663,000, the highest figure since September 1997.

David Kern, chief economist at the British Chambers of Commerce, said the national figures hid some worrying trends: "Full-time employment continues to fall; the number of people working part-time is at a record high; there was a large increase in those claiming benefits; and inactivity has risen further."

Dr John Philpott, chief economic adviser at the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, warned the headline figures did not tell the full story of the impact of recession on jobs because around 2.8million workers were under-employed.

"The latest unemployment figures show conditions in the UK labour market remain extremely weak and indicate that talk of the jobless rate having already peaked is premature.

"Today’s figures confirm that the UK jobs market is still in an extremely fragile state."

Unemployment in the county on January 14:

Kent and Medway, 37,328 (up 1,964); Medway, 7,659 (up 356); Rest of Kent, 29,669 (up 1,608); Ashford, 2,023 (up 86); Canterbury, 2,556 (up 182); Dartford, 2,154 (up 197); Dover, 2,526 (up 91); Gravesham, 2,695 (up 167); Maidstone, 2,646 (up 202); Sevenoaks, 1,504 (up 108); Shepway, 2,751 (up 132); Swale, 3,408 (up 123); Thanet, 4,372 (up 68); Tonbridge and Malling, 1,687 (up 139); Tunbridge Wells, 1,347 (up 113).