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It's boom time for jobs

THE Australian jobs story just keeps getting better, with new figures showing the strongest growth in jobs in the nation's history.

Some 300,000 jobs were created in the past eight months, with 39,100 being added in April alone.

Despite a fall in part-time employment by 32,200, the nation's unemployment rate stayed steady at 5.1 per cent last month, while total employment closed in on the 10 million mark. Australia's 10 millionth worker is likely to get their job by the end of the financial year.

Treasurer Peter Costello said with unemployment at a 28-year low, there was never a better time to find work.

"People have never had a better chance of getting a job in the last 28 years than they had in the month of April 2005," he told Parliament.

The biggest fall in unemployment was in New South Wales, down 0.4 percentage points to 5.1 per cent, while in Western Australia it fell to 4.8 per cent.

But it rose in Queensland (up to 5.0 per cent from 4.3 per cent), Victoria (up to 5.5 per cent from 5.4 per cent) and Tasmania (up to 6.8 per cent from 6.0 per cent).

It stayed steady in South Australia at 5.2 per cent.

On a trend measure, unemployment stayed steady in both the Northern Territory at 6.0 per cent and the Canberra, which enjoys the nation's lowest unemployment rate at 3.3 per cent.

Commonwealth Bank's CommSec chief equities economist Craig James said the days of sub5 per cent unemployment were within grasp. He said the 300,000 jobs added in the past eight months was the largest increase ever recorded.