§ Mr. Richard Pageasked the Secretary of State for Employment when the next census of employment is to be held.
§ Mr. PriorIn 1981. Serious delays in the census results have built up since 1976 through attempting computerisation too rapidly. Following efforts to overcome the problems, the 1977 results are being published this week. The 1978 results should be produced later this year, but to conduct in addition a further census would have required excessive staff resources and not produced results much sooner than 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.