§ Mr. Martenasked the Secretary of State for Employment what is the latest figure for unemployment in the United Kingdom expressed as a percentage.
§ Mr. Golding, pursuant to his reply [Official Report, 29 March 1979; Vol. 965, c. 307], gave the following answer:
At 8 March, the provisional number of people registered as unemployed in the United Kingdom was 1,402,254 and the unemployment rate was 5.9 per cent.
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§ Mr. Lawsonasked the Secretary of State for Employment if he will provide a table showing in descending order and for the latest available year the proportion of the total national workforce who are members of the trade unions in the United Kingdom and all other Organisation of Economic Co-operation and Development member States for which figures are available.
§ Mr. Golding,pursuant to his reply [Official Report, 15 March 1979; Vol. 904, c. 310], gave the following answer:
Given below is the most recent available information from national sources. These data are approximate and, owing to differences national definitions and coverage may not be strictly comparable.
Trade Union membership as a percentage of the labour force Per cent. Year Sweden 78 1977 Portugal 66 1978 Belgium 64 1978 Finland 64 1978 Austria 60 1977 Denmark 60 1978 Italy 50 1978 United Kingdom 48 1977 Australia 43 1977 Irish Republic 39 1975 New Zealand 38 1977 Norway 37 1976 Netherlands 36 1977 Luxembourg 34 1978 Canada 31 1978 Germany (FR) 27 1978 Switzerland 26 1976 France 25 1978 Japan 23 1977 Spain 20 1978 United States 20 1976