Plan A working - Unemployment Falls

Unemployment is down by 36,000, it's not a huge amount but it's down none the less. The total number of people in employment rose to 29.24m which isn't bad compared to a pre-recession peak in May 2008 of 29.56m. Youth unemployment is still 20% but that is a fall from last quarter.

Overall Labour will argue that it's too slow and that the increase in jobseekers claimants (up by 12,400) shows that we are spending more money on benefits than would be spent if we just continued increasing public sector employment (That's my prediction for an attack question at PMQs today).  However some of those will be people moving off disability benefits after being reassessed and found fit to work and the overall trajectory is positive.

Basically Plan A is working, so Ed Balls couldn't be more wrong with his constant "we need a Plan B"  message.

Bootnote:
Picture stolen from Guido, it was just too good.

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