Lieut.-Colonel MALONEasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland if he will state the number of unemployed in Ireland on the 1st June, 1918, the 1st January, 1919, and the 1st June, 1919?
§ Mr. WARDLEThere are no available figures showing the total number of persons unemployed in Ireland on the three dates specified. The only figures that afford a reliable basis of comparison are those relating to workpeople compulsorily ensured under the Unemployment Insurance Acts, numbering about 113,500, and belonging mainly to the shipbuilding and engineering trades. For this group of workpeople the figures of unemployed are approximately as follows:
June, 1918 … … 3,000* January, 1919 … … 12,000** March, 1919 … … 27,000** June, 1919 … … 21,000** * Receiving unemployment insurance benefit. ** Receiving out-of-work donation. The figures for 1919 include, of course, a number of demobilised men who were serving with the forces in 1918. I have inserted the figures for March, 1919, to show that unemployment in this group of industries is now tending to decline after the increase which followed on the Armistice. I should add that the total number of persons drawing out-of-work donation does not even approximately represent the total number of unemployed in that country because the donation scheme is not of universal application, but limited to certain trades.