HC Deb 22 May 1997 vol 294 cc836-7
Sir Teddy Taylor

To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will review Her Majesty's Government's plans for dealing with unemployment levels in seaside towns in the south-east. [206]

Mr. Alan Howarth

We will indeed. We cannot accept unemployment at its present level, whether in seaside towns in the south-east or anywhere else. That is why we are already engaged in detailed and urgent work to introduce our new programmes to help the long-term unemployed and get 250,000 young people into jobs. The hon. Gentleman will be aware that his constituents are benefiting from the European programme KONVER II and that they are eligible to benefit from European social funding objective 3. Possibly the hon. Gentleman would regard those as tainted sources.

Sir Teddy Taylor

Is the Minister prepared to be serious and to tell me how much cash has come to Southend, East, as set against the monstrous amount of grants, loans and subsidies going to other parts of the country? Perhaps he should take the issue more seriously. Does he accept that the seaside towns have a real problem of high unemployment? My constituency has unemployment of more than 10 per cent. That creates a great deal of misery and lack of opportunity. Will the Minister be prepared to consider establishing a special study to examine whether there is an equal sphere of public investment? Secondly, should there not be a study of the utter distortion that is created by grants, loans and subsidies that are given to other areas with much lower rates of unemployment?

Mr. Howarth

The funding from the KONVER II programme to the hon. Gentleman's constituency is £105,000. Much more substantially, the hon. Gentleman's constituents are benefiting from single regeneration budget funding of £2.2 million to regenerate the area of Shoeburyness. The hon. Gentleman is right in contending that these programmes must be kept under review, and that is what we shall do. Apart from anything else, we need the most accurate and up-to-date map of unemployment. Much unemployment is concentrated in compact, tightly drawn geographical areas. In those areas, we need to understand as much as we can about the nature of the local unemployment problem.

I shall value the hon. Gentleman's advice, as will Ministers and officials at the Department of Trade and Industry. We shall have much in mind the real and distinctive problems that are suffered by the hon. Gentleman's constituents.