A jobs recovery that puts the EU to shame

NEARLY three quarters of working-age Britons now have a job (an astonishing figure that includes two million EU workers and well over a million from outside Europe). That is the highest rate of UK employment since records began.

How apt that these figures should be released yesterday, just as David Cameron – who originally said he would not back staying in the EU without ‘fundamental reform’ – was attempting to extract ludicrously modest concessions from the leaders of countries with disastrous levels of unemployment. Talk about a two- speed Europe! On one side of the Channel – ours – the rate of unemployment stands at just over five per cent.

On the other side, there is seven per cent unemployment in Poland and Sweden, eight in Belgium, 10 in France, 11 in Italy, 21 in Spain and nearly 25 in Greece. Only Germany and the Czech Republic beat us, at 4.5 per cent. The European average is nine per cent.

The Government deserves credit for the latest UK figures. Admittedly, our levels of productivity are worrying and youth unemployment is more than twice the national average.

Yes, this is a modest recovery. However, our economy is booming compared to the woeful finances of much of Europe.

But then, with every month that passes, Britain does less trade with the EU and more with the rest of the world.

Thanks to the one- size-fits-all euro, continental economies are sluggish. A desperate shortage of jobs is reviving the ugly ideologies of both the far Left and far Right.

A Martian arriving on this planet might ask: Why on Earth would Britain want to stay in this club?