New fears as jobless up by 20% in parts of the Westcountry

By Western Morning News | Tuesday, January 10, 2012, 08:00

Rising unemployment has shown little sign of abating in the Westcountry as the dole queue grew by one-fifth in parts of the region last year, figures show.

But research carried out by the House of Commons library also reveals the proportion of people out of work in the far South West is significantly lower than most UK regions.

Of 24 constituencies in Cornwall and Devon and parts of Somerset and Dorset, only three languish in the top half of a UK-wide worklessness league table.

But lower Westcountry unemployment compared to Birmingham, Middlesbrough, Belfast and other black spots risks masking the rising number receiving jobless benefits.

According to the analysis of the latest official unemployment figures for November, all but one of the region's constituencies – Totnes – saw the number of benefit claimants going up year-on-year.

North Cornwall recorded the biggest jump with an increase of 22 per cent, or 247 more people claiming Jobseeker's Allowance (JSA). On the other side of the Tamar, South West Devon notched up an increase of 20.4 per cent, or an extra 170 people drawing down the benefit.

Fifteen more constituencies – Bridgwater and West Somerset, Camborne and Redruth, Central Devon, East Devon, Exeter, Newton Abbot, North Devon, South East Cornwall, St Austell and Newquay, St Ives, Taunton Deane, Tiverton and Honiton, Torbay, Torridge and West Devon, and Truro and Falmouth – also recorded increases of more than 10.3 per cent, which was the UK average. The figure dropped 0.9 per cent (or 10 people) in Totnes. But as a proportion of the working population, the Westcountry is coping better with the fallout from the recession than most.

In Birmingham Ladywood, 21.8 per cent of the constituency are on JSA, ranking it number one out of 650 parliamentary seats. By contrast, the highest rate in the Westcountry is 7.3 per cent in Plymouth Sutton and Devonport, giving the constituency a ranking of 149. Only Torbay and Plymouth Moor View are also in the wrong half of the table in the region.

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Comments

When you lives in the city you get paid alot of money from the governmant to sit on your backside and drink alcohol. In the country we just drinks and gets on with our work.

By Devon_Farmer at 14:09 on 12/01/12
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Regions dependent on the tourism "industry" will always see unemployment rise out of season so this is news how? We need real industry to employ people all year round and pay decent wages instead of low paid seasonal jobs like those in tourism.

By josdave at 13:37 on 12/01/12
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Precisely, Ping! We've had the past decade or so of our lives thoroughly wasted by this idiotic reflective counterpoint in policy? The trouble is it's scrambled everyone's brainwaves in the process and we are now all officially mad!

By thinbird12 at 12:22 on 12/01/12
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Or the figures could also demonstrate that we had massively high levels of unemployment here among workiing age people in the first place, so it hasn't increased that much in comparison with other areas.

By Pingu007 at 12:29 on 11/01/12
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On the contrary Doit, most of these people have no more problems than anyone else. It's just a convenient label that's been traditionally used to exclude some from low-grade work and ensure they are guaranteed their housing tenure.

I too believed a reversal of this policy was under way. But, since the New Year began, practically everyone I've spoken to tells me they are no longer required to sign on at the Job Centre and have been bumped off the dole onto other, more generous types of benefit. What's more they are enormously grateful for it, given the abuse being routinely handed out to them in the local workplace. We're talking about fit, intelligent applicants, by the way. People who would be an asset to any employer, but are now the victims of wide-scale job protectionism in the area.

In other words, all the jobs are taken and they don't want the government or anyone else replacing them with cheaper, better qualified applicants, thank you very much. If it means inventing 'complexities' that don't actually exist in order to maintain the status quo, there are a lot of people who are more than happy to go along with it. Won't be long before they start locking gay men and unmarried maiden aunts away in attics again ... what a wicked web of deceit some people weave...

By thinbird12 at 12:17 on 11/01/12
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