The information requested falls within the responsibility of the National Statistician, who has been asked to reply.
Letter from Karen Dunnell, dated 7 January 2008:
As National Statistician I have been asked to reply to your Parliamentary Question about the employment rate of (a) men and (b) women aged over 50 was in each region in each quarter of the last 10 years. (174840)
Not-seasonally adjusted estimates for regional employment rates by age are published each quarter in the Labour Market Statistics Regional First Releases. For figures since quarter 3 2005 please visit the following link;
http://www.statistics.gov.uk/OnlineProducts/LMS_regional.asp
The attached table shows selected historical quarters and has been derived from the published tables. It shows the employment rate of men and women aged 50 to retirement age for the three month period ending June each year, from 1997 to 2007. These estimates are not-seasonally adjusted.
Estimates are taken from the Labour Force Survey (LFS). As with any sample survey, estimates from the LFS are subject to a margin of uncertainty.
United Kingdom North East North West Yorkshire and the Humber East Midlands West Midlands East London South East South West Wales Scotland Northern Ireland Men (50-64) 1997 67 55 62 62 70 72 73 68 75 72 59 63 61 1999 69 54 63 63 72 71 75 69 79 74 59 62 62 2001 70 59 65 68 72 69 77 69 78 76 59 67 61 2002 70 56 64 70 73 71 77 69 78 73 62 64 63 2003 72 61 70 70 77 73 77 70 78 76 64 70 66 2004 72 58 68 71 74 71 76 72 79 75 66 70 67 2005 72 60 65 71 73 73 78 75 79 75 63 72 66 2006 73 65 68 72 75 75 77 72 78 75 67 69 66 2007 73 68 69 69 72 73 79 70 78 76 66 74 64 Women (50-59) 1997 61 51 56 59 64 62 66 62 67 66 56 54 51 1999 63 53 60 61 63 65 68 63 69 69 55 60 53 2001 65 62 61 65 67 65 68 65 72 68 57 64 49 2002 65 59 62 63 68 67 70 64 73 69 56 64 56 2003 67 58 68 68 68 66 71 64 72 69 63 67 57 2004 67 55 66 67 67 68 74 64 72 71 62 68 53 2005 68 63 65 69 71 67 72 67 73 72 63 67 54 2006 68 62 66 69 71 71 71 65 74 72 63 68 57 2007 69 62 65 69 70 71 72 66 77 74 64 72 55 Note: Comparable data not available for 1998 and 2000. Source: ONS Labour Force Survey (LFS)