§ 38. Mr. HERBERT WILLIAMSasked the Minister of Labour if he will arrange to publish in the Labour Gazette monthly a statement as to the numbers on the live registers of the Employment Exchanges who are not in receipt of unemployment benefit?
§ Sir A. STEEL-MAITLANDI am not sure that it would be possible to compile accurate statistics of this description without excessive labour, but I am having inquiry made.
41. Mr. T. THOMSONasked the Minister of Labour the total number of unemployed who received unemployment benefit in the second week in March, 1924, and in the corresponding week in March of this year?
§ Sir A. STEEL-MAITLANDAt 2nd March. 1925, the latest date for which figures are available, the number of persons registered at Employment Exchanges in Great Britain who had claims to benefit current at that date was 1,169,069, as compared with 1,057,007 at 3rd March, 1924.
Mr. THOMSONArising out of that very considerable increase in the unemployed, is the Department prepared to put in hand additional schemes for the relief of the unemployed above what was done last year?
§ Sir A. STEEL-MAITLANDI am always ready, as I have told the hon. Member, to consider schemes, but the
| — | Men. | Boys. | Women. | Girls. | Total. |
| Not normally insurable and not seeking to obtain a livelihood by means of insurable employment. | — | — | — | — | — |
| Insurable employed not likely to be available | 15 | — | 8 | — | 23 |
| Not reasonable period of insurable employed during the preceding two years. | 161 | — | 6 | — | 167 |
| Not making every reasonable effort to obtain suitable employment, or not willing to accept suitable employment. | 16 | 3 | 40 | 1 | 60 |
| Failure to satisfy new conditions of waiver | 3 | — | — | — | 3 |
| Others (Failure to attend hearing, etc.) | 9 | — | 1 | — | 10 |
| 204 | 3 | 55 | 1 | 263 | |
| Note. —Some of those entered under the last heading ("Failure to attend hearing, etc.'') may have had their claims allowed at a subsequent hearing, and the total number of final rejections is therefore somewhat less than that given in the Table; precise figures on this point are not available. |
§ difficulty is to find schemes which are really suitable. On the other hand, I ought to warn him that he must not draw too immediate a comparison from these two sets of figures, as it is probable that, owing to the effect of last year's Act, another roughly between 70,000 and 90,000 ought to be deducted from this year's figures to make them fairly comparable with last year.
§ Mr. W. THORNEDoes the right hon. Gentleman think he will be able to find a solution to the unemployed question during his term of office?
§ Sir A. STEEL-MAITLANDI indicated it on Monday at the end of my statement.
§ Colonel DAYPerhaps the right hon. Gentleman will give the House some information why he did not make this deduction during the last Election.