§ Helen JonesTo ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what estimate he has made of the number of people in the Warrington, North constituency who are unemployed but not claiming benefit. [6662]
§ Mrs. Liddell[holding answer 10 July 1997]: The information requested falls within the responsibility of the Chief Executive of the Office for National Statistics. I have asked him to arrange for a reply to be given.
Letter from Tim Holt to Helen Jones, dated 15 July 1997:
The Chancellor of the Exchequer has asked me to reply as the Director of the Office for National Statistics to your recent question on unemployment in the Warrington North parliamentary constituency.The measure of unemployment, derived from the quarterly Labour Force Survey (LFS), is defined on a consistent and internationally recognised basis set out by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) and counts as unemployed people who are: a) without a job: b) available to start work within the next two weeks and c) have either looked for work in the last four weeks or are waiting to start a job already obtained. However, largely because it is a sample survey, information is not available from the LFS in as much geographical detail as from the claimant count measure.Information about those ILO unemployed who are not claiming unemployment related benefits is collected for the LFS. However, no such information is available below county level.