The national unemployment figures out this week (August 15) brought some good news. They are not yet at gold, silver or even bronze levels – but they have taken a turn for the better which some experts put down mainly to the number of temporary jobs connected to the Olympic Games.
The number of those unemployed across the nation fell by 46,000 to 2,560,000 in the three months to June. At eight per cent, it’s the lowest level since July 2011.
The July figures for the Devizes constituency showed very little movement. There were marginal decreases in those claiming benefit in the 25-49 and 50-and-over age groups. Those still unemployed in the 24-and-under group were slightly up, and those claiming jobseekers allowance for more than a year – the ‘long-term unemployed’ – showed no movement.
But the prospect for future movement in the jobs market within the constituency looked good with a significant increase in job vacancies.
Nationally, however, this month’s figures reinforced a worrying trend: the number of part-time workers jumped 71,000 to 8,070,000 – the highest total for twenty years. And a record 1,420,000 are in part-time jobs but want to be in full-time jobs.
There seems to be a rush to get people out of the claimant column into any level of part-time employment. This must be worrying the Treasury as the increase in part-time workers will inevitably hit both tax revenues and high street spending.
This was confirmed at the start of the month when figures for the first three months of the year showed UK households’ real spending power had fallen by 0.6 per cent as wages failed to keep abreast of rising prices.
