A year earlier, the unemployment rate was higher at 3.4 percent.
The number of unemployed persons decreased by 60 thousand or 2.9 percent to 2.04 million from the previous year. While the number of employed persons increased by 280 thousand or 0.4 percent compared to December 2014 to 63.85 million.
The labour force participation rate increased by 0.2 p.p. to 59.5 percent from 59.3 percent in December last year.
The jobs-to-applicants ratio was 1.27 percent, up from 1.25 in November, hitting its highest level in 24 years.