Mr. John David Taylorasked the Secretary of State for Employment what is the latest estimate for the number of jobs dependent on the United Kingdom's continued membership of the European Economic Community; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. GummerOur Department does not prepare estimates of the effect on employment of United Kingdom membership of the European Community. We are, however, satisfied that very many jobs in both 361W manufacturing and services do in fact depend upon our membership. It is for our firms and their employees, by improving competitiveness, to draw increasing advantage from the direct access to a market of 270 million people which we obtain from our membership of the Community. We are confident that the opportunities created by this market will continue to bring substantial benefits in employment both to our partners and ourselves.
§ Mr. Pikeasked the Secretary of State for Employment if he will list the specific projects concerned and the amounts received from the European Economic Community social funds from June 1979 to the latest date for which information is available; and how this has affected funding from the Government.
§ Mr. GummerInformation is not available in the form requested and could only be obtained at disproportionate cost. In 1983 around 400 allocations were made by the European Commission to organisations in the United Kingdom. The total amount of these allocations was £321 million. This broke down, with comparable figures for the years since 1979, as follows:
£ million Schemes to assist 1983 1982 1982 1980 1979 Young people (under 25 years) 240.7 151.5 85.1 71.9 67.5 People in assisted areas 41.5 65.4 33.2 50.4 49.9 Handicapped people 17.8 22.9 17.0 9.3 10.7 Migrant workers 7.8 9.6 0.9 1.2 0.6 Technical progress 6.7 3.7 2.2 0.7 — Textile workers 3.8 3.1 2.0 1.2 2.5 Women over 25 2.4 0.8 0.5 0.1 0.4 Innovatory projects 0.2 0.6 0.2 0.3 0.3 Groups of firms — — 0.2 0.5 — 320.9 257.6 141.3 135.6 131.9 Most of the money allocated to the United Kingdom is in respect of employment and training schemes run by the Manpower Services Commission and, in Northern Ireland, the Department of Economic Development. In deciding the resources required for these schemes, the Government take into account the possibility of assistance from the Eueopean social fund, as is noted, for example, in the Public Expenditure White Paper (Cmnd. 9143).