SHOCK findings on job centre vacancies in Chorley have been revealed in a survey - spelling gloom for the unemployed.

Chorley Borough Council's economic development and tourism committee was presented with the the Low Pay Unit-prepared report.

It revealed that: almost half the jobs on display were part-time - the majority of which were for eight-16 hours a week; the average hourly pay rate was only £3.78; average weekly pay was only £103.73, with the full-time average £152.48 and the part-time average £54.28; a third of the jobs paid below the National Insurance threshold of £61 a week, well over half paid below £150 and threequarters below £170.

Some 60 per cent of the jobs were in hotels and catering, care work, shops and cleaning.

Coun Lindsay Hoyle, deputy leader of the council and chairman of the committee, said: "This report reveals the shock reality behind our so called Rolls Royce economy - part-time, low paid, poverty jobs are increasingly taking the place of full-time, well paid employment.

"What local people are looking for and deserve are 'real jobs' paying realistic living wages and providing real employment opportunities."

The report entitled "Jobwatch Chorley 1996" - commissioned by the council - was based on a survey of vacancies in Chorley Jobcentre in September last year.

The Low Pay Unit's Gabrielle Cox, who presented the report to the committee, claimed the high levels of part-time work, low hourly rates of pay and low weekly incomes meant it would be difficult for an unemployed person in Chorley to find a job which produced a living wage for a family with two children.

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