Gross Value Added

Lord Wigley Excerpts

Wednesday 13th January 2016 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Wigley]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what are the latest figures for the gross value added per head in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland respectively.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde (Con)]

My Lords, the latest figures published by the Office for National Statistics show that in 2014 gross value added per head was £25,367 in England, £17,573 in Wales, £23,102 in Scotland and £18,682 in Northern Ireland.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Wigley (PC)]

My Lords, last week the Chancellor of the Exchequer boasted in Cardiff about the UK Government’s role in securing a small improvement in the Welsh economy. That being so, do they also take their share of the responsibility, at least, for the fact that the average Welsh income per head is still more than 25% below the average for England? That has stubbornly been the fact for the past three decades. Are the Government totally complacent about that?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, as the House knows, my right honourable friend the Chancellor is a modest man and will take credit only where it is due. The fact is that since he became Chancellor, some 70,000 jobs have been created in Wales, unemployment has fallen by 30% and we have invested £69 million in rolling out superfast broadband to 500,000 homes and businesses. But as the noble Lord has said, it is also true that since GVA statistics started in their current form in 1997, under all Governments GVA in Wales has been around 70% of that in England every year. Certainly, the Chancellor is not going to take responsibility for all those years, but the good news is that since 2010, Wales’s GVA has grown at a faster rate than England’s.