Lying in bed with a dose of Christmas flu and feeling generally sorry for myself as men are wont to do, I decided to have a look online at the Western Mail today despite promising not to look at any newspapers.
Most prominent was the interview with Rhodri Morgan on the potential state of the UK economy who suggested that there would be over five million out of work if the Conservatives were to come to power next year.
Well, I am afraid to say that the former First Minister is already behind the times as this has already happened under the current Labour Government.
As a recent article in the Times stated, if we take the official number of UK unemployed at 2.49 million, add the half a million who would like to move from part-time to full-time, and then finally the 2.26 million people who are economically inactive who would like a job, then we already have 5.76 million people who would like to work more - about 15 per cent of the working-age population.
I am sure that Rhodri Morgan, as he did in the Western Mail's letters pages on Christmas Eve, will quibble over definitions and semantics but let's keep things simple for the sake of everything else - these figures show that mass unemployment has arrived under Labour and has probably been here for several years.
Given that the economic record of Wales has been the worse of all the UK regions during the last decade, it is both sad and regrettable that the man at the helm of three Assembly Governments that have been responsible for this decline now believes he can give lessons to the rest of the country on economic matters.
Most prominent was the interview with Rhodri Morgan on the potential state of the UK economy who suggested that there would be over five million out of work if the Conservatives were to come to power next year.
Well, I am afraid to say that the former First Minister is already behind the times as this has already happened under the current Labour Government.
As a recent article in the Times stated, if we take the official number of UK unemployed at 2.49 million, add the half a million who would like to move from part-time to full-time, and then finally the 2.26 million people who are economically inactive who would like a job, then we already have 5.76 million people who would like to work more - about 15 per cent of the working-age population.
I am sure that Rhodri Morgan, as he did in the Western Mail's letters pages on Christmas Eve, will quibble over definitions and semantics but let's keep things simple for the sake of everything else - these figures show that mass unemployment has arrived under Labour and has probably been here for several years.
Given that the economic record of Wales has been the worse of all the UK regions during the last decade, it is both sad and regrettable that the man at the helm of three Assembly Governments that have been responsible for this decline now believes he can give lessons to the rest of the country on economic matters.
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