Employment

This week new figures revealed that employment rose by 140,000 this quarter, with the employment rate reaching 73.6 per cent, the highest on record.

The unemployment rate fell to 5.4 per cent, its lowest rate since early 2008, with nearly 200,000 fewer unemployed people than last year.

In the Arundel and South Downs constituency, there were just 286 Jobseeker's Allowance claimants in September, one of the very lowest rates in the whole country.

These figures show that the Government’s welfare reforms are supporting people off benefits and into work.  There are now 1 million fewer people claiming the main out of work benefits than in 2010, and over 2 million more people in work.

Nationally the number of long-term unemployed people has fallen by more than 25 per cent in the last year to 526,000 – the lowest level in 6 years.

There are almost 360,000 more people in work compared to this time last year – and 80 per cent off these were full time jobs.

There are 920,000 more women in work since 2010 and the number of unemployed women has fallen by 73,000 in the year.

Nearly two thirds of lone parents are now in work, the highest on record.  The number of lone parents without a job fell by 30,000 in the last year

The number of unemployed young people who are not full-time students is the lowest in a decade – now just 6.2 per cent of the youth population.

We are often told that the new jobs that have been created are part-time, insecure and poorly paid.  In fact, three-quarters of the growth in employment since 2010 have been full-time jobs.  Only 2.4 per cent of people in work are on zero-hours contracts.

And as inflation falls to zero, wages continue to rise at an average of 3 per cent a year, so real wages are rising strongly.

We can take nothing for granted, especially when the economies of some of our trading partners are slowing.

But these figures on employment and wages growth are immensely encouraging, because economic security is so important for every family.