HC Deb 18 May 1981 vol 5 cc7-8W
Mr. Colvin

asked the Secretary of State for Employment if he will publish a regional breakdown of the youth opportunities programme for the last full year for which figures are available, showing the expenditure and the number of places provided.

Mr. Peter Morrison

The provisional estimate of expenditure on the youth opportunities programme for the year 1980–81 is some £215 million. The regional breakdown of this figure is as follows:

Numbers of registered disabled people unemployed Percentage of registered disabled people who are unemployed Numbers of unregistered disabled people unemployed
1980
April 61,068 13.0 81,780
May 60,552 12.9 81,605
June 60,395 12.8 83,602
July 61,323 13.0 86,240
August 62,962 13.4 88,992
September 63,908 13.6 90,720
October 64,958 13.8 92,122
November 66,887 14.2 94,657
December 68,660 14.6 96,964
1981
January 70,343 14.9 100,319
February 71,428 15.2 101,931
March 72,183 15.3 102,965

As the number of unregistered disabled people in the total population is not known the unemployment rate

Region Expenditure (£ millions)
London 6.4
Midlands 33.6
Northern 23.1
North-West 42.1
Yorks and Humberside 18.7
South-West 13.2
South-East 16.1
Scotland 29.5
Wales 16.5
Centrally-funded schemes 2.5
Administration 13.4

Entrant figures cannot be directly related to expenditure figures within the regions for a number of reasons including the following:

Some expenditure relates to entrants for the previous financial year.

Not all regions have the same mix of schemes and some schemes are more expensive than others.

Entry patterns throughout the year differ between the regions.

360,000 young people entered the programme in the year 1980–81, broken down regionally as follows:

Region Entrants
London 10,600
Midlands 63,500
Northern 42,800
North-West 64,000
Yorks and Humberside 35,900
South-West 27,500
South-East 35,800
Scotland 49,300
Wales 30,600