Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate she has made of variations in the ratio of unemployment benefit recipients, including job seeker's allowance and universal credit to ILO-definition unemployment by (a) age group, (b) region, (c) previous occupation and (d) other segmentation in the last five years.
Over the last five years, the ratio between the Alternative Claimant Count (ACC) measure of claimant unemployment[1], and the ONS official measure of unemployment (based on the International Labour Organisation’s definition of unemployment)[2], has increased. This is shown in the table below and chart attached.
| ACC: claimant | ONS National Statistic: unemployment level (thousands) | Ratio: ACC / Unemployment |
Aug-14 | 1,545 | 2,044 | 0.76 |
Aug-15 | 1,299 | 1,838 | 0.71 |
Aug-16 | 1,219 | 1,691 | 0.72 |
Aug-17 | 1,194 | 1,500 | 0.80 |
Aug-18 | 1,195 | 1,446 | 0.83 |
Aug-19 | 1,263 | 1,374 | 0.92 |
The two measures of unemployment should not be expected to match:
The tables below show how the ratio between the two measures of unemployment has varied over the last five years, for different ages, genders and regions. The variation by previous occupation is not available.
Age | ACC: claimant | ONS National Statistic: | Ratio: ACC / Unemployment | |||
Aug-14 | Aug-19 | Aug-14 | Aug-19 | Aug-14 | Aug-19 | |
16-24 | 284 | 210 | 830 | 570 | 0.34 | 0.37 |
25-34 | 388 | 322 | 411 | 263 | 0.94 | 1.22 |
35-49 | 490 | 398 | 474 | 263 | 1.03 | 1.52 |
50+ | 384 | 334 | 339 | 278 | 1.13 | 1.20 |
Gender | ACC: claimant | ONS National Statistic: | Ratio: ACC / Unemployment | |||
Aug-14 | Aug-19 | Aug-14 | Aug-19 | Aug-14 | Aug-19 | |
Men | 844 | 672 | 1,125 | 764 | 0.75 | 0.88 |
Women | 702 | 591 | 919 | 609 | 0.76 | 0.97 |
Region | ACC: claimant | ONS National Statistic: | Ratio: ACC / Unemployment | |||
Aug-14 | Aug-19 | Aug-14 | Aug-19 | Aug-14 | Aug-19 | |
NE | 89 | 75 | 122 | 77 | 0.73 | 0.97 |
NW | 191 | 167 | 223 | 166 | 0.86 | 1.01 |
Y&H | 163 | 119 | 207 | 116 | 0.79 | 1.02 |
E Mids | 107 | 83 | 139 | 113 | 0.77 | 0.73 |
W Mids | 170 | 147 | 205 | 124 | 0.83 | 1.18 |
East | 113 | 91 | 164 | 113 | 0.69 | 0.81 |
London | 251 | 206 | 302 | 233 | 0.83 | 0.88 |
SE | 141 | 122 | 216 | 156 | 0.65 | 0.78 |
SW | 90 | 75 | 135 | 80 | 0.67 | 0.94 |
Wales | 85 | 63 | 104 | 59 | 0.81 | 1.06 |
Scotland | 144 | 115 | 174 | 113 | 0.83 | 1.02 |
For nearly all of the categories (with the exception of East Midlands), the ratio of ‘ACC claimant unemployment’ to ‘ONS official unemployment’ has increased between 2014 and 2019. This is predominantly due to a decrease in the ONS official measure of unemployment.
[1] Alterative Claimant Count: Provides a consistent measure of claimant unemployed by modelling what the Claimant Count would have been had Universal Credit been fully rolled-out.
[2] ILO-definition of unemployment: Individuals without a job who have been actively seeking work within the last four weeks, and are available to start work within the next two weeks.