Employment rate hits 44-year high
GEORGE Osborne got an early Christmas present yesterday as statistics showed Britons now work a record billion hours per week.
There were more than 31million workers in the quarter to October, with almost 74 per cent of working-age adults employed – the highest since comparable records began in 1971.
An extra 207,000 people employed brought the total hours worked a week past the one billion mark, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) found.
The unemployment rate fell to its lowest for almost ten years – a post-recession low of 5.2 per cent.
And the number of unemployed dropped by 110,000 to 1.7million, the lowest since early 2008. Youth unemployment was at a ten-year low of 13.6 per cent.
The Chancellor said: ‘Our plan for a more prosperous future is delivering for working people with pay packets growing, and the new national living wage will deliver a further boost next year.
‘This is good progress but as we move closer to our goal of full employment we need to continue to help the hardest to reach into work and ensure as many people as possible benefit from the growing economy.’ The proportion of people classed as economically inactive, including those looking after family, on long-term sick leave or who have given up looking for work, was the lowest since 1991 at 21.9 per cent.
But the number on out-of-work benefits increased by 3,900 to 796,200. Earnings growth slowed by 0.6 per cent on the previous month, to 2.4 per cent.
ONS statistician David Freeman said: ‘Earnings continue to grow in real terms, though at a slower rate than we have seen in recent months.’ Employment Minister Priti Patel said the figures meant the country was ‘ending the year on a high’.
British Chambers of Commerce chief economist David Kern said the figures were ‘encouraging’. He added: ‘These figures demonstrate that our flexible and vibrant labour market remains a source of strength for the UK economy.’
And Michael Martins, of the Institute of Directors, welcomed the figures, saying:
‘Flexible and vibrant labour market’
‘All of this indicates we are closing in on full employment.’
But some raised concerns over slowing pay growth. Resolution Foundation analyst Laura Gardiner said: ‘The pay rebound we’ve enjoyed throughout much of 2015 appears to have weakened, despite inflation remaining at historically low levels.’
And TUC general secretary Frances O’Grady said: ‘With living standards still not fully recovered, many families will be worse off this Christmas than they were before the recession. For the recovery to deliver for everyone, we need stronger growth in pay and productivity in 2016.’
WHERE criticism is deserved, this paper has never hesitated to take the Chancellor to task, whether for his ill thought-out plans for tax credits or his Autumn Statement’s over- reliance on rosy economic forecasts.
But we also give credit where it’s due. And as yesterday’s jobs figures show, George Osborne deserves it by the bucketload for his success in cutting unemployment by another 110,000 to its lowest in almost eight years, while wages are rising in real terms.
Most remarkable of all, he has achieved this through a huge expansion in the private sector, while shrinking the public payroll – Labour’s client state – to its smallest since records began in 1999. Indeed, he is recalibrating the British economy in a way vital to future generations’ prosperity.
For this, no praise can be high enough.