Unemployment in the Illawarra has soared to 9.1 per cent, with prospects of breaking the 10 per cent barrier within months.
The figures, released yesterday, came as the region's business and community leaders discussed ways to solve the problem with NSW Premier Nathan Rees at the Illawarra Jobs Summit.
Figures for Wollongong, Shellharbour and Kiama show the jobless rate has jumped significantly from 7.9 per cent for February to 9.1 per cent for March, with 1360 more people registering as unemployed over the month. There are now 12,500 unemployed people in the region.
Illawarra Regional Information Service research manager Natalie Viselli said the increase was higher than expected.
"There was also a drop-off in the participation rate ... meaning some people have lost confidence and given up looking for work," she said.
"Looking at the way things are going, we could reach 10 per cent in a couple of months."
At the jobs summit, Mr Rees acknowledged the rising jobless rate in front of 60 delegates during his second visit to Wollongong in the past month.
"You can talk about budgets in deficit and budgets in surplus ... they're economic terms, but a family without a job is a tragedy," he said.
"Once you get it up into those double-digit ranges, you're talking about serious social issues."
The Mercury understands ideas presented behind closed doors at the forum included the need for less bureaucratic red tape, lower government taxing for the unemployed and requests for the Government to promote the Illawarra as a location for businesses that might otherwise move interstate. Opportunities for infrastructure spending around the Crown St Mall area and bus interchange were also suggested.
Throsby MP Jennie George is understood to have told delegates that the most important way to attack unemployment in the Illawarra was to help protect jobs at BlueScope.
Mr Rees was said to have given a lukewarm response to the idea of investing money into helping unemployed Generation Y-skilled professionals find work, arguing the long-term unemployed and semi-skilled were a bigger priority.
Mr Rees said the Government would consider all ideas put forward and report back within months.
"No premier can stand here ... and say they will protect every job," he admitted.
"We're in a difficult period but the challenge for us is to make sure we emerge from the difficult period in better shape than when we went in."
Mr Rees also talked up his $250,000 green-jobs plan for the region, saying diversification and establishing a "first-mover advantage" were the main keys to growing the Illawarra's economy.
He admitted no jobs plan could bring immediate results but smart planning now would ultimately mean a brighter future.
Meantime, Opposition environment spokeswoman Catherine Cusack has criticised the green jobs plan, describing it as "utter fraud".
"We have actually been losing green jobs in NSW," she said, claiming solar technology infrastructure was no longer being produced in the state. "The idea that through dripping around a little bit of grant money we will create green jobs is ludicrous."
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