Employment in Ontario has remained relatively stable for the fifth consecutive month, according to Statistics Canada.

The national agency’s November Labour Force Survey shows the unemployment rate in the province dropped by a slight amount, from 6.2 per cent to 6.1 per cent.

Statistics Canada also noted the unemployment rate is up 1.3 percentage points from April.

About 6,500 new jobs were added in Ontario over the last month.

Of those, about 6,100 were in manufacturing.

Canada as a whole saw an increase in manufacturing and construction jobs over the last month.

Statistics Canada reported that unemployed people in November “were more likely to have been laid off from their previous job, reflecting more difficult economic and labour market conditions in 2023 compared with 2022.”

They note that among the country’s largest metropolitan areas, St. Catharines-Niagara and Oshawa in Ontario had the largest unemployment rate increases between April and November.

In the last month, the unemployment rate in Toronto also dropped, from 6.8 per cent to 6.6 per cent.

The November Labour Force Survey uses the week of Nov. 5 to Nov. 11 as a reference.