HC Deb 24 November 1972 vol 846 cc1836-7

3.57 p.m.

Mr. Albert Booth (Barrow-in-Furness)

I beg to move, That this House, being seriously concerned at the unemployment of 1,365,755 persons shown by the 1971 Census and the grave extent to which this was underestimated by the Department of Employment whose figure for the corresponding period was 773,800, rejects the Government policies which have created this unemployment which has brought with it degradation and misery and placed school leavers on the dole instead of in work; and calls upon the Government to adopt a policy of full employment which shall include a shorter working week without loss of pay, a proper manning of public services, extended holidays, a reduction of all overtime working, lower interest rates, control of export capital, cuts in arms expenditure, direction of industry and special investment grants to regions of high unemployment, lower retirement ages on adequate pension throughout retirement and higher social benefits and wages creating a higher consumers' market. From the level of unemployment shown by the 1971 census, it is evident that the Government's economic policy is totally wrong and that, for the benefit of a small minority, they have brought about social hardship to the increasing number of unemployed people and their dependants. In spite of the proof that the method of calculating unemployment statistics used by the Department of Employment underestimates the total number of unemployed, the Department has introduced a method which will underestimate it even further. The most telling figure in relation to jobs and unemployment, to which the Government should turn more attention, is that from 1966 to 1971 the total number of jobs fell by 1,300,000. That figure is much easier to reconcile with the figures shown by the census than are the unemployment figures produced by the Department of Employment.

In the engineering sector of industry there was a decline of 302,000 jobs between August, 1969 and August, 1972. This was not limited to any one section of the engineering industry. In fact, it was to be made up of drops in employment in instrument manufacturing, electrical engineering, marine engineering and vehicle engineering. For this reason the Government must realise that even with the vast increase—

The Under-Secretary of State for Employment (Mr. Dudley Smith)

Has the hon. Gentleman seen the recently published figures showing that there was—

It being Four o'clock, Mr. DEPUTY SPEAKER interrupted the Business.