asked the Secretary of State for Employment what was the percentage of the working population unemployed as an average for each year since 1960 up to the latest year for which figures are available ; and what was the size of the working population in each year of the same period.
It is my Department's normal practice to calculate unemployment rates as a percentage of the latest available mid-year estimate of employees—employed and unemployed—which differs from the working population in that it excludes self-employed people and members of Her Majesty's Forces.The following table gives average percentage rates of unemployment on this basis for each year from 1960 to 1979.
| 1960 | 1·5 |
| 1961 | 1·4 |
| 1962 | 1·9 |
| 1963 | 2·3 |
| 1964 | 1·6 |
| 1965 | 1·4 |
| 1966 | 1·4 |
| 1967 | 2·2 |
| 1968 | 2·4 |
| 1969 | 2·3 |
| 1970 | 2·5 |
| 1971 | 3·4 |
| 1972 | 3·7 |
| 1973 | 2·6 |
| 1974 | 2·6 |
| 1975 | 4·1 |
| 1976* | 5·6 |
| 1977 | 6·0 |
| 1978 | 6·0 |
| 1979 | 5·6 |
| *Average of eleven months. | |
| 1960 | 22,333 |
| 1961 | 22,627 |
| 1962 | 22,944 |
| 1963 | 23,063 |
| 1964 | 23,209 |
| 1965 | 23,417 |
| 1966 | 23,554 |
| 1967 | 23,293 |
| 1968 | 23,152 |
| 1969 | 23,083 |
| 1970 | 22,928 |
| 1971 | 22,336 |
| 1972 | 22,417 |
| 1973 | 22,728 |
| 1974 | 22,813 |
| 1975 | 23,041 |
| 1976 | 23,326 |
| 1977 | 23,516 |
| 1978 | 23,544 |
| 1979 | 23,593 |
asked the Secretary of State for Employment what is the total number of unemployed people in the United Kingdom ; and how many of them are under 25 years of age.
At 10 April, the latest date for which the quarterly age analysis is available, the number of people registered as unemployed in the United Kingdom was 1,522,927, of whom 551,105 were under 25 years of age.