Asked by: Lord Wigley (Plaid Cymru - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what are the latest figures for employee activity rates for (1) England, (2) Scotland, (3) Wales, and (4) Northern Ireland.
Answered by Baroness Twycross - Baroness in Waiting (HM Household) (Whip)
The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.
Please see the letter attached from the National Statistician and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority.
The Rt Hon. the Lord Wigley
House of Lords
London
SW1A 0PW
11 November 2024
Dear Lord Wigley,
As National Statistician and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority, I am responding to your Parliamentary Question asking what are the latest figures for employee activity rates for (1) England, (2) Scotland, (3) Wales, and (4) Northern Ireland (HL2370).
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) collects information on the labour market status of individuals through the Labour Force Survey (LFS), which is a survey of people resident in households in the UK. The responses allow us to estimate how many people are in employment, and how many of those are in employment as employees, as opposed to other forms of employment such as self-employed.
Due to the current smaller sample sizes being achieved by the LFS, recent estimates are showing increased volatility and should be treated with additional caution.
The latest available estimates (June to August 2024) of the rates of employees for people aged 16 to 64 years, determined as the percentage of the population in employment as an employee, resident in each of the UK’s four nations, are presented in Table 1.
Table 1: Rates of employees, people aged 16 to 64 years, England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland, not seasonally adjusted.
| England | Scotland | Wales | Northern Ireland |
June to August 2024 | 66.5% | 65.0% | 62.7% | 62.2% |
Source: Labour Force Survey
Yours sincerely,
Professor Sir Ian Diamond
Asked by: Lord Wigley (Plaid Cymru - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government which inquiries conducted under the Inquiries Act 2005 involved matters which were wholly or partly devolved in Wales when the inquiry started.
Answered by Baroness Twycross - Baroness in Waiting (HM Household) (Whip)
Since the introduction of the Inquiries Act 2005, there have been three inquiries which include matters which are partly or wholly devolved to Wales: the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, the Infected Blood Inquiry, and the UK Covid-19 Inquiry.
Asked by: Lord Wigley (Plaid Cymru - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether payments of compensation to contaminated blood victims will be funded outside the projected annual expenditure on health and social security budgets.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Shadow Minister (Treasury)
Given the uncertainty over costs, the scheme will be scored as Capital Annually Managed Expenditure. Annually Managed Expenditure is spend on programmes which are demand led - such as welfare, tax credits or public sector pensions. It is spent on items that may be unpredictable or not easily controlled by departments, as opposed to Departmental Expenditure Limits (DEL) which are allocated to and spent by Government departments. We will set out what this means for the public finances in the usual way at the next fiscal event.
Asked by: Lord Wigley (Plaid Cymru - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what are the most recent statistics on the Economic Activity Rate of each of the UK's four nations, and what were the equivalent rates (1) 10, and (2) 20, years earlier.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Shadow Minister (Treasury)
The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.
Please see the letter attached from the National Statistician and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority.
The Rt Hon. the Lord Wigley
House of Lords
London
SW1A 0PW
Dear Lord Wigley,
As National Statistician and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority, I am responding to your Parliamentary Question asking what are the most recent statistics on the Economic Activity Rate of each of the UK’s four nations, and what were the equivalent rates (1) 10, and (2) 20, years earlier (HL4552).
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) collects information on the labour market status of individuals through the Labour Force Survey (LFS), which is a survey of people resident in households in the UK.
The responses allow us to identify how many people are economically active; that is, those who are engaged with the labour market, either through employment or who are unemployed and actively seeking work. We are also able to calculate economic activity rates by region using these data.
Due to the current smaller sample sizes being achieved by the LFS, recent estimates are showing increased volatility and should be treated with additional caution. We are currently undertaking a programme of work to improve our estimates of the UK labour market. As part of this work, we have updated our labour market estimates from July to September 2022 onwards to incorporate more up to date estimates of the UK population. Labour market estimates prior to this remain based on older population estimates. Therefore, the latest available estimates of the UK labour market, for January to March 2024, are on a different population basis than those ten and twenty years earlier. As a result of this we recommend caution when considering long-term movements in these series.
The latest available estimates (January to March 2024) of the economic activity rates, for people aged 16 to 64 years, resident in each of the UK’s four nations are presented in Table 1, alongside estimates for January to March 2014 and January to March 2004.
Yours sincerely,
Professor Sir Ian Diamond
Table 1: Economic Activity Rates, people aged 16 to 64 years, England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland, seasonally adjusted.
| England | Scotland | Wales | Northern Ireland |
January to March 2004 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
January to March 2024 [1] |
|
|
|
|
Source: Labour Force Survey
[1] Estimate based on more up to date population estimates and subject to greater volatility due to smaller achieved sample sizes. We advise caution when interpreting movements in these series.
Asked by: Lord Wigley (Plaid Cymru - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what are the latest employment activity rates for (1) each region of England, (2) England, (3) Wales, (4) Scotland, and (5) Northern Ireland.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Shadow Minister (Treasury)
The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.
Please see the letter attached from the National Statistician and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority.
I will deposit a copy of the dataset for employment activity rates for each region of England, England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland in the House Libraries.
The Rt Hon. the Lord Wigley
House of Lords
London
SW1A 0PW
21 December 2023
Dear Lord Wigley,
As National Statistician and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority, I am responding to your Parliamentary Question asking for the latest employment activity rates for (1) each region of England (2) England (3) Wales, (4) Scotland, and (5) Northern Ireland (HL1373).
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) collects information on respondents’ labour market status as part of the Labour Force Survey (LFS), which is a survey of people resident in households in the UK.
The economic activity rate is the proportion of the UK population aged 16-64 years who are engaged with the labour market, either through employment or searching for work while unemployed. The employment rate is the proportion of the UK population aged 16 to 64 years who are employed.
The latest LFS estimates available are for the period April to June 2023. Due to increased uncertainty in LFS estimates from May to July 2023, the latest LFS estimates are not being released. To give users a more considered view of the labour market, we have applied growth rates from administrative data (HMRC PAYE RTI (Pay As You Earn Real Time Information) for employment and Claimant Count for unemployment) to April to June 2023 LFS data to produce adjusted employment, unemployment, and economic inactivity estimates.
Table 1 shows estimates of economic activity and employment rates using LFS data from March to May 1992 to April to June 2023, and experimental adjusted estimates from May to July 2023 to August to October 2023.
As the data are quite extensive, a copy of Table 1 has been placed in the House of Lords Library.
Yours sincerely,
Sir Ian Diamond
Asked by: Lord Wigley (Plaid Cymru - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what are the latest annual figures for gross value added per head of population for (1) England, (2) Wales, (3) Scotland, and (4) Northern Ireland.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Shadow Minister (Treasury)
The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.
Please see the letter attached from the National Statistician and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority.
The Rt Hon. the Lord Wigley
House of Lords
London
SW1A 0PW
11 December 2023
Dear Lord Wigley,
As National Statistician and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority, I am responding to your Parliamentary Question asking for the latest annual figures for gross value added per head of population for (1) England, (2) Wales, (3) Scotland, and (4) Northern Ireland (HL898).
The latest available annual figures are for the calendar year 2021, published on 25 April 2023 as part of the regional economic activity by gross domestic product UK: 1998 to 2021 [1] release. Although the headline statistics in this release focus on gross domestic product (GDP), the published tables also include gross value added (GVA) estimates, which differ from GDP only in that they exclude the effect of taxes (less subsidies) on products.
The GVA per head figures you have requested are as follows:
(1) England, £31,138 per person
(2) Wales, £22,380 per person
(3) Scotland, £27,361 per person
(4) Northern Ireland, £24,007 per person
Yours sincerely,
Professor Sir Ian Diamond
Asked by: Lord Wigley (Plaid Cymru - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they intend to introduce legislation to require all providers of public services (whether the provider is a public body or in the private sector), to provide a facility, whenever they email customers or potential customers, for that email to be answered by email and not to prevent a response with a "no-reply" communication address.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Shadow Minister (Treasury)
The Cabinet Office is not aware of any plans to introduce legislation preventing departments from responding with a "no reply" email.
Each department is responsible for deciding how it communicates with members of the public by email.
Some departments may wish to send emails from a "no reply" email address to ensure that follow up emails are sent through the correct routes and handled consistently and effectively. However, all departments will either have an email address or a contact form that can be accessed on GOV.UK for members of the public.
Asked by: Lord Wigley (Plaid Cymru - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what estimate they have made of how many UK citizens emigrated in each of the last five years for which figures are available.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Shadow Minister (Treasury)
The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.
Please see the letter attached from the National Statistician and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority.
The Rt Hon. the Lord Wigley
House of Lords
London
SW1A 0PW
11 July 2023
Dear Lord Wigley,
As National Statistician and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority, I am responding to your Parliamentary Question asking for an estimate of how many UK citizens emigrated in each of the last five years for which figures are available (HL9085).
The figures for British nationals emigrating out of the UK for the last five years are shown in Table 1 which is sourced from Figure 2 of our Long-term international migration, provisional: year ending December 2022 bulletin [1] which was released in May.
Table 1: Number of British nationals emigrating out of the UK, between 2018 and 2022
Period | British |
YE Dec 2018 | 94,000 |
YE Dec 2019 | 98,000 |
YE Dec 2020 | 59,000 |
YE Dec 2021 | 76,000 |
YE Dec 2022 | 92,000 |
Source: Office for National Statistics
Please note that these are currently our best estimates but are subject to change. This is because in September 2023 we will be updating our migration estimates across the previous decade as part of rebased population estimates to align with Census 2021. For more information, please see our Provisional plans for publishing the latest population and migration estimates [2].
When accessing any of our files you may find it useful to read the 'notes, terms and conditions' contained within them.
Yours sincerely,
Professor Sir Ian Diamond
Asked by: Lord Wigley (Plaid Cymru - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what the average income per head in the latest financial year for which figures are available was in each of Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland and the regions of England.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Shadow Minister (Treasury)
The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.
A response to the Noble Lord’s Parliamentary Question of 10th May is attached in the answer.
The Rt Hon. the Lord Wigley
House of Lords
London
SW1A 0PW
17 May 2023
Dear Lord Wigley,
As National Statistician and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority, I am responding to your Parliamentary Question asking what the average income per head in the latest financial year for which figures are available was in each of Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland and the regions of England (HL7765).
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) does not produce average income per head estimates of this nature. However, the Effects of Taxes and Benefits on UK Household Income is routinely produced at household-level, in line with international recommendations [1]. This is done so under the assumption that household income is the optimum measure of economic well-being and living standards on individuals given the likelihood that household members share resources.
Table 1 provides UK household disposable income at the International Territorial Level 1 (ITL1) for financial year ending 2021. A more detailed breakdown of income components is available at the ITL1 region is available as part of the ONS’ annual release of Effect of Taxes and Benefits on UK Household Income [2]. Published data currently covers up to financial year ending 2021, with financial year ending 2022 provisionally scheduled for June 2023.
Yours sincerely,
Professor Sir Ian Diamond
[1] https://unece.org/statistics/publications/canberra-group-handbook-household-income-statistics-2ndedition
[2] https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/personalandhouseholdfinances/incomeandwea lth/bulletins/theeffectsoftaxesandbenefitsonhouseholdincome/financialyearending2021/relateddata
Table 1: Average household disposable income by Region, financial year ending 2021, UK
Region | Disposable income (£) |
North East | 36,730 |
North West | 41,755 |
Yorkshire and The Humber | 39,538 |
East Midlands | 45,489 |
West Midlands | 41,011 |
East | 48,011 |
London | 61,000 |
South East | 55,817 |
South West | 43,042 |
England | 47,734 |
Wales | 39,331 |
Scotland | 39,670 |
Northern Ireland | 40,198 |
All individuals | 46,473 |
Source: Office for National Statistics, Effects of Taxes and Benefits
Asked by: Lord Wigley (Plaid Cymru - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what is their target for answering written correspondence from the general public; and what percentage of answers met that target in (1) 2019, (2) 2020, and (3) 2021.
Answered by Lord True - Shadow Leader of the House of Lords
The Government places great importance on the effective and timely handling of correspondence, including from members of the public. The Cabinet Office currently aims to respond to correspondence from members of the public in 20 working days, in line with the guidance on handling correspondence.
The Cabinet Office has responded to: 48% of public correspondence received in 2019 within 20 working days, 82% of public correspondence received in 2020 within 20 working days, and 88% of public correspondence received between 1 January and 31 October 2021 within 20 working days.