The latest figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) shows that the number of Scots in work, at just over 253,000, is at its highest level for more than four years. That’s up by 13,000 up on the previous quarter’s total and the highest since early 2009. And to confirm the positive trend, the number of people without a job fell by 1,000 over the three months to June and now stands at 198,000, giving a Scottish unemployment 7.2%, below the UK average of 7.8%.
Michael Moore
Scottish Secretary
The Scottish Secretary, Michael Moore, described the latest figures as encouraging. “We are seeing some positive signs in our economy’s recovery,” he said, but it is important we keep focusing on creating the best conditions for growth and jobs. Investment is a key way to stimulate the labour market and we must use Scotland’s capital spending power increase to £3.3bn in the last spending round to best effect.”
Finance Secretary John Swinney also welcomed the figures, adding that they demonstrated “…further progress on Scotland’s economy. The employment rate in Scotland continues to rise and is higher than the other three nations of the UK. Not only is the unemployment rate lower than this time last year, but the number of people claiming Job Seeker’s Allowance has fallen to its lowest level since June 2009. Our youth employment rate is also surpassing that of the UK.”
Grahame Smith STUC
However, there were conflicting interpretations of the statistics from industry. For example, Grahame Smith, General Secretary of the STUC, argued that they confirmed the STUC’s view that unemployment in Scotland was stagnating at a high level. “Following a significant fall in early autumn 2012,” he said, “unemployment has hardly moved. This week has seen publication of more survey evidence supposedly confirming the strength of the UK’s recovery from a prolonged period of economic depression. However, workers experiencing rapidly declining real wages and rising insecurity of employment certainly don’t feel as if they’re benefiting from an improving economy and labour market.”
Lauren Paterson
Senior Policy Executive
CBI Scotland
By contrast, CBI Scotland’s Senior Policy Executive, Lauren Paterson, said that the country could “take some confidence from today’s news that unemployment has fallen, and employment is rising. However too many still face the reality of being out of work and we would encourage the Scottish Government to use next month’s Budget to support the recovery, by keeping business taxes down, investing more in infrastructure and skills and encouraging more air links to overseas business destinations.”
Andy Willox, the Federation of Small Businesses’ (FSB) Scottish policy convenor, agreed that falling unemployment was “good news for Scottish small businesses and the communities they serve alike. Small and medium sized businesses play a critical role in the labour market, especially in rural and remote areas. By focussing on giving them the tools to succeed and tackling the barriers to their growth, the FSB believes we can develop broader, more stable local economies.” He added that jobs were no being created uniformly across the country which meant that “more needs to be done to accelerate recovery in every part of Scotland.”
The Chief Executive of the Scottish Chambers of Commerce, Liz Cameron, described the new as “extremely welcome”, adding that today’s results were “the latest of a wide range of indicators that is pointing towards evidence of a more broadly-based economic recovery in Scotland. We are not out of the woods yet, however, and government efforts to maintain the recovery will continue to be necessary over the coming years.”