Tory MPP Monte McNaughton said premier-designate Kathleen Wynne, who will be sworn in with her new cabinet Monday, needs to take dramatic action to stem the bleeding.

"This is the greatest number of job losses in one month since the recession," McNaughton said Friday.

NDP Leader Andrea Horwath said the Statistics Canada employment figures for January are a clear signal that the legislature needs to get back to work after months of Liberal leadership campaigning.

"It's disappointing that yet again we see job numbers that are poor and a government that spent the last couple of months, instead of focusing and concentrating on the economy and jobs, they've been focusing on the wellbeing of their own political party," Horwath said.

Stats Canada reported that Ontario lost 43,000 full-time jobs in January, offset by an increase of 11,600 part-time jobs, so that Ontario was down 31,200 jobs overall.

Economic Development and Innovation Minister Brad Duguid said jobs numbers fluctuate from month to month but the province added more than 52,000 new positions in 2012.

"Since the recessionary low in June 2009 we have created 380,200 net new jobs. In fact, the pace of job creation in Ontario is ahead of that of the United Kingdom, United States and all the Great Lakes states," Duguid said in a statement.

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Unemployment Rates in January

Canada: 7%
Ontario: 7.7%
Ottawa: 5.8%
Kingston-Pembroke: 7%
Muskoka-Kawarthas: 8.1%
Toronto: 7.8%
Kitchener-Waterloo-Barrie: 6.1%
Hamilton-Niagara Peninsula: 6.5%
London: 7.1%
Windsor-Sarnia: 9.1%
Stratford-Bruce Peninsula: 4.8%
Northeast Ontario: 8.8%
Northwest Ontario: 5.4%

(Source: Statistics Canada)