§ Mr. Michael MeacherTo ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will make it his policy to estimate the level of EEC funding from social and regional grants that has been lost in each of the last five years as a result of the accumulative effect each year of the reductions in the officially declared level of United Kingdom unemployment following changes in the calculation of the unemployment figures.
§ Mr. Atkins[holding answer 12 June 1989]: I have been asked to reply.
The question is based on a false hypothesis. Payments from the European social and regional development funds are not directly determined by unemployment levels. In so far as, following the recent reform of the funds, eligibility for grant partly depends on rates of unemployment, the relevant rates are European Commission estimates prepared on a standardised basis to eliminate any effects of differences of statistical method between Member States or at different periods.