Unemployment (Hansard, 24 January 1996)

§ 13. Sir Roger Moate
To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment what is the current figure for unemployment (a) in the United Kingdom and (b) in other European Union countries. [9427]

§ Mr. Forth
On the International Labour Organisation measure, unemployment in the UK in November 1995 was 8.1 per cent.—lower than in any other major European country and well below the European Union average of 10.6 per cent.

§ Sir Roger Moate
Those figures show again that Conservative policies are working in making Britain the enterprise centre of Europe and bringing unemployment down at a time when it is rising fast in Germany and France. Would not UK unemployment rocket even to the level in socialist Spain if Labour was ever in a position to sign up this country to the social chapter, impose a minimum wage and give in to every inflationary wage demand from its union paymasters?

§ Mr. Forth
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. People are becoming daily more aware of the comparison that can be made between this country's success in establishing an enterprise economy, attracting inward investment, encouraging entrepreneurship and new businesses and reducing the unemployment rate for 28 successive months, and the policies of our continental partners and competitors on the mainland—who are experiencing rising unemployment because they have shackled their economies with the social chapter, statutory minimum wage and all the other restrictions that Labour would seek to impose on our economy. That comparison is well understood by people throughout the country.

§ Mr. Pike
Will the Minister accept that it is not a good Government record to claim that they have reduced unemployment to the level that they have, when so many people in temporary or part-time jobs want full-time jobs? They are working in low-pay and, in many cases, poverty-pay jobs that are an absolute disgrace for Britain in 1996.

§ Mr. Forth
I regret that the hon. Gentleman did not seem to be in the Chamber for earlier questions. We have tried to get it across to Labour Members—unsuccessfully so far—that temporary work accounts for a much lower proportion of our work force than in most continental countries. The hon. Gentleman may regard temporary work as some sort of evil, but his party will create the conditions to increase temporary work rather than the other way around. As to the other factors that the hon. Gentleman mentioned, it should be understood by Labour Members that the vast majority of people who work part time do so from choice as a result of their individual circumstances. We encourage individual choice, but obviously Labour Members do not.