Title
Claimant Count
Description
This dataset shows Claimant Count as a percentage of residents aged 16 to 64 (official statistics in development), in the UK, for 2001 to 2023.
Coverage
UK
Geography definition
Local Authority Districts and Unitary Authorities, Counties, Combined Authorities, Regions, Nations (England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland), Countries (GB, England and Wales)
Source
- United Kingdom: Office for National Statistics
Data is also available on NOMIS
Source Notes and Caveats
- Proportions of people claiming are the number of claimants divided by the population aged from 16 to 64 from mid-year 2021 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.