There was a rise in the unemployment rate last month.
Stats Can reports in Saint John, it went up from 7.3 in November to 7.7 per cent last month.
The jobless rate in Moncton also rose from 5.8 per cent to 6.2 per cent.
The unemployment rate for New Brunswick also increased from 8.7 to 8.9 per cent in spite of a net gain of 300 fulltime jobs.
Nationally, employment rose by 23,000 last month with the unemployment rate unchanged at 7.1%.
In December, employment increased among people aged 55 and older and was little changed for the other age groups.
Employment gains totalled 158,000 or 0.9% in 2015, slightly above the growth rate of 0.7% over the same period in 2013 and 2014.
Full-time employment rose by 151,000 or 1.0% in 2015, while part-time work was little changed.
Provincially, the fastest employment growth in 2015 was in British Columbia, up 2.3%.
