§ Mr. Amessasked the Paymaster General if he will give the numbers of unemployed people, as well as the percentage rate of unemployed people, for each of the last five years, in Basildon.
§ Mr. LeeFollowing is the available information, which is also in the Library. The table shows the numbers of unemployed claimants in the Basildon local authority district in December of each year since 1983. The comparison is affected by the change in the compilation of the unemployment statistics in March 1986. Statistics of unemployment for local authority districts are derived from the ward-based system and are available only from June 1983. Unemployment rates are calculated only for self-contained labour markets, the smallest areas are travel-to-work areas.
Numbers December, 1983 8,587 December, 1984 9,046 December, 1985 8,524 December, 1986 8,325