Eurozone jobless total hits new high

Eurostat said 18.7 million people were out of work across the eurozone, an increase of 173,000 on the previous month.

Spain and Greece have the region's highest unemployment rates - both over 25 per cent, with youth unemployment levels heading towards 60 per cent.

Both countries are in recession and struggling to get a grip on their debts.

And both have introduced tough austerity measures, such as cutting spending and raising taxes.

However, reducing wages and pensions has lowered demand in the economy to the detriment of the labour force.

"Labour market conditions in the single currency area are clearly deteriorating and indicators of employment intentions point to worse to come," said chief European economist at Capital Economics Jonathan Loynes.

At present, the five eurozone countries at the forefront of the debt crisis - Greece, Spain, Italy, Cyprus and Portugal - are in recession.

Others, like the Netherlands and Austria could officially fall into recession after posting declines in third-quarter economic output.

The eurozone's powerhouse economies, such as Germany and France, have also seen growth levels fall in the last year, which is ratcheting up the pressure on their economies.

Germany's unemployment rate stood at 5.4 per cent in October, but France's was nearly double that at 10.7 per cent.

Despite the decline, inflation is still above the European Central Bank's target of 2 per cent.