HC Deb 19 March 1981 vol 1 cc185-6W
Mr. Adley

asked the Secretary of State for Employment what was the number of people employed in March 1951 compared with March 1981.

Mr. Peter Morrison

The following table gives midyear estimates of the numbers of employees in employment in Great Britain for 1951 and 1980. In making comparisons account should be taken of a discontinuity at 1959. The figures from 1959(b) are from the continuous series of employment estimates, which take account of discontinuities in the earlier published series and are not comparable with those from 1951 to 1959(a) which are by earlier methods of calculation.

Thousands
June 1951 20,526
June 1959
(a) 21,565
(b) 20,983
June 1980 (provisional) 22,008