To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, pursuant to Treasury press release 60/97 of 4 June 1997, what is his definition of a real and lasting job. [3357]

The Chancellor of the Exchequer's "Getting Europe to Work" initiative (announced in Treasury Press release 60/97) is about promoting job creation and social cohesion in Europe. It focuses on the need for a skilled, trained and adaptable labour force and a flexible labour market, underpinned by minimum standards of fairness and decency including a national minimum wage. The Government is committed to introduce programmes to help young people and the long-term unemployed move from welfare and into work.These policies are aimed at creating and underpinning real and lasting jobs. They therefore mark a break from past cycles of unemployment followed by places on dead-end schemes and brief periods of unskilled temporary work which did nothing to enhance people's long term employment prospects or reduce their dependence on welfare.