§ 7. Mr. Ioan Evansasked the Secretary of State for Wales what was the ratio in Wales of the number of unemployed to the number of employment vacancies at the latest available date.
§ Mr. Nicholas EdwardsThe information is not available, since there are no comprehensive figures of the number of employment vacancies at any one time.
§ Mr. EvansWith more than 170,000 people unemployed and fewer than 8,000 vacancies, does the right hon. Gentleman appreciate that 20 people are chasing every vacancy in Wales and that the situation is even worse in many areas? Does he further appreciate that the catalogue of closures that we had during the last Parliament has continued since the general election? Is he aware that in Cynon Valley alone there is a threatened closure of a CWS creamery because of the import of foreign milk, that there has been the announcement of 50 per cent. redundancies at Aberdare Cables and that the Government are talking about closing the tax office there?
§ Mr. EdwardsObviously I would not argue with the hon. Gentleman when he says that there have been closures. However, he entirely ignores the fact that this year there has been a record number of factory allocations on top of the record number last year. We are attracting a great deal of new industry and new firms into Wales, many of them in the new technologies.
§ Mr. Allan RogersAs the Member of the European Parliament for South-East Wales, the constant complaint 606 that I have received from local authorities and other organisations in my area is that applications for aid from the European regional development fund have been held up at the Welsh Office. Will the Secretary of State explain why his Department constantly publishes figures of moneys received from the ERDF which are related primarily to schemes already completed and not to new job-creating schemes? When will his Department stop this hypocritical way of publicising moneys received from the European Community, although I recognise that it is a technique that is promoted by the Prime Minister?
§ Mr. SpeakerOrder. Supplementary questions are getting rather too long at Welsh Question Time today.
§ Mr. EdwardsI should thought that the hon. Gentleman would welcome the fact that there have been such substantial receipts from the ERDF for Wales. Indeed, I note that we have been subject to criticism recently from fellow Members of the European Parliament from outside Wales because it is felt that Wales is getting a disproportionate share of those receipts. The hon. Gentleman is not, therefore, being fair in his comments.