§ MR. HADDOCK (Lancashire, North Lonsdale)To ask the President of the Board of Trade if he will state in what respects the basis upon which official Returns of unemployment are collected in Germany differs from that of the United Kingdom; and whether any estimate can be made of the latest British unemployment figure if the Returns were collected on the German basis.
(Answered by Mr. Churchill.) I am afraid that the subject of the comparability of British and German statistics of unemployment is too large to be dealt with satisfactorily in reply to a Question. A detailed memorandum discussing the matter will be printed as an Appendix to the forthcoming Report of an inquiry into the cost of living in German towns. I may, however, state that the main points of difference may be grouped under three heads: (1) the inferior facilities possessed by German trade unions for recording the total number of their unemployed members; (2) the smaller proportion of members of German trade unions who are qualified to receive unemployed benefit; (3) the different proportions in which the various groups of trades are represented in the two sets of statistics. Owing to the nature of these differences it is not possible to form such an estimate as the hon. Member asks for in the latter part of his Question.