§ Mr. RuaneTo ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many households without work for two years or more there were in each local authority in Wales in each of the past 10 years. [81336]
§ Ms HewittThe information requested falls within the responsibility of the Director of the Office for National Statistics. I have asked him to reply.
Letter from Tim Holt to Mr. Chris Ruane, dated 20 April 1999:
As Director of the Office for National Statistics (ONS), I have been asked to reply to your recent parliamentary question on workless households.The Labour Force Survey (LFS) is the ONS's major source of labour market data. Data by local authority area is not available on the combined economic activity of household members, and categories such as that requested, would undoubtedly be too small to identify at local authority level for both reliability and confidentiality reasons.Household datasets are available for spring 1990, each spring quarter from 1992 to 1994 and spring and autumn quarters since spring 1995. An article was published in Labour Market Trends (January 1999 issue), a copy of which is available in the House of Commons Library, giving a range of household data from the LFS using spring 1998 data. Table 8, on page 38, includes workless households by Government Office Region which may be of interest.