§ Mr. Rentonasked the Secretary of State for Employment what is the total amount of allocations made to the United Kingdom from the European social fund in 1981.
§ Mr. AlisonThe Commission of the European Communities recently announced the third and final batch44W of allocations from the European social fund for 1981. For the year as a whole, the United Kingdom has been allocated a total of £141.1 million. This represents 25.1 per cent. of all allocations under the fund, compared with this country's share in 1980 of 23.3 per cent.
Of this year's allocations to the United Kingdom, some £85 million is for employment and training schemes for young people, £33 million for training and employment schemes located within the assisted areas, and £17 million for schemes to train handicapped people for open employment. Schemes operated by Government departments, the Manpower Services Commission, the manpower services in Northern Ireland, nationalised industries, local authorities, private and voluntary organisations have all received allocations.
These allocations represent another significant benefit to the United Kingdom of membership of the European Community. Since our accession, more than £700 million has been allocated in grants from the European social fund to schemes in this country.