LONDON - Official data shows that unemployment in the United Kingdom dropped to 7.8 per cent in the three months to October as the number of jobless fell by its largest amount since 2001.
The Office for National Statistics says Wednesday that the fall from the previous quarter's 8 per cent came as 82,000 people came off the unemployment register, which stands at 2.51 million.
The improvement came at a time Britain emerged from a nine-month recession. In the third quarter of the year, the British economy grew by a quarterly rate of 1 per cent.
The agency also says that total pay growth continued to lag inflation, rising 1.8 per cent compared to a year earlier. Consumer price inflation in October was 2.7 per cent.
