[SYDNEY] Australian job advertisements in newspapers and on the Internet boasted a fourth straight month of growth in November, another encouraging sign that the demand for labour was improving.

A monthly survey by Australia and New Zealand Banking Group showed total job advertisements rose 1.3 per cent to 156,187 per week on average in November, from October when they rose 0.3 per cent.

Ads were 12.3 per cent higher on November last year.

Internet ads climbed 1.4 per cent in November, while newspaper ads fell 4.3 per cent. Newspaper ads have been in decline for years and account for only a fraction of the total. "Australia's labour market continues to send positive signals about the current state of the economy," said Felicity Emmett, ANZ's co-head of Australian economics. "Overall activity is clearly being supported by labour intensive services industries." Employment has surprised with its resilience for some months now with government data showing a particularly strong increase of 58,300 for October.

The November jobs report is due on Thursday and analysts are forecasting a dip of around 10,000 as payback.

Emmett said the unemployment rate could stay stuck around 6 per cent until later next year and predicted jobs growth would slow as the boost from strong property market activity and a lower currency began to wane. "There is a risk, however, that job ads are signalling that employment growth could remain relatively strong for some time yet and the unemployment rate could decline a little," added Emmett.

The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) cited solid employment growth as one reason for keeping interest rates unchanged at 2.0 per cent after its December policy meeting last week.

REUTERS