More than 200 people joined the dole queue in the Canterbury area last month.

The figure for those out of work rose to 1,772, up 216.

In Swale the figure went up by 296 to 2,381.

Across Kent and Medway the number of people out of work and claiming benefit soared to 24,797, an increase of 2,639 over the previous month.

The latest figures were taken on December 11, before a spate of layoffs in the past few weeks fed through into the statistics.

Redundancies towards the end of last year and this month are likely to send numbers up again in February.

Nationally, the claimant count increased by 77,900 to 1.16million, the worst figure since January, 2000. It has gone up by 349,000 over the year.