UNEMPLOYMENT levels across South Lakeland have risen to more than five times they were pre pandemic

This is according to new job centre figures that point to around 2,000 South Lakes residents being unemployed currently.

4,439 people in the district are currently on welfare support, the figures say. The statistics also suggest that approximately 2,300 of those people are presently in employment.

The numbers represent an increase of more than five times the pre-pandemic unemployment levels in the area, which before the pandemic typically hovered somewhere between 300 and 500.

Due to the tourism-reliant nature of the South Lakes economy, around 40 per cent of the workforce in the district is thought to have been claiming furlough support or other forms of government aid over recent months.

As those government support schemes begin to taper off, fears of a historic jobs crisis this winter are beginning to mount.

South Lakes MP Tim Farron is to argue the area’s economy is a ‘special case’ that makes further aid necessary. He said the coming months represent ‘the biggest unemployment crisis we’ve witnessed in 40 years’ and that the ‘young and self-employed are being hit disproportionately hard’.