HEADLINE figures suggested unemployment fell by 5,000 people across Wales but in Gwent the number of Job Seekers Allowance(JSA) claimants remained stagnant.

The latest figures, released by the Office of National Statistics (ONS) for October, show that the total number of people claiming JSA across the region rose by a net increase of 77 claimants from September.

Only Torfaen, which saw its claimant count fall from 3,043 to 3,000 managed to cut the number of people requiring the out of work benefit with all four other local authorities seeing extra people signing on at the Jobcentre.

Blaenau Gwent saw the biggest rise in Gwent with 70 new claimants, followed by Newport with 39, Monmouthshire six and Caerphilly five.

It means there are still more than 19,000 people claiming JSA across the region as a whole.