§ Mr. Lawrenceasked the Secretary of State for Employment if he will indicate when the census of employment figures for Staffordshire from mid-1977 onwards will be available; and why the figures are not produced sooner.
§ Mr. Jim LesterThe 1977 census of employment figures for Staffordshire are available.
Serious delays in the census results have built up since 1976 through attempting computerisation too rapidly. Following efforts to overcome the problems, the 1978 results should be produced by the end of this year but to conduct in addition a 1980 census would have required excessive staff resources, and not produced results much sooner than the second quarter of 1982, the time now planned for those for 1981. The absence of a census for 1980, together with the cancellation last year of that for 1979, will lead to substantial savings in costs for both Government and firms.