Euro Zone Unemployment at Record High

The sky is not falling, Eurocrats insist

EU data agency Eurostat said the seasonally-adjusted rate was the same as an upwardly-revised May toll but noted another 123,000 people lost their jobs going into the European summer, bringing the total to nearly 18m, more than 2m up on a year earlier.

Marking a 14th successive monthly rise, analysts noted a cumulative rise of 2.248m people since that series began in April last year, with London-based Howard Archer of IHS Global Insight warning that the unemployment rate "now looks odds-on" to cross 11.5pc by the end of the year, with "a very real danger" of reaching 12pc next year.