To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what proportion of redundancies in the last year were in manufacturing industry.

During the 12 months to January 1991, 65 per cent. of all confirmed redundancies were in manufacturing industries.

Does not this signal a very dire state for the British economy and for the future of British industry? In the early 1980s, we were told that manufacturing industry was being sorted out so that it would be ready to compete with the rest of Europe. Now the Minister tells us of major cuts in employment. It is also true that there has been a £7 billion downturn in manufacturing output since last March. What are the Government going to do to support employment of the highest calibre in manufacturing industry and to give this country a chance?

The hon. Lady overlooks a significant difference. It is that while manufacturing employment fell during the lifetime of the Labour Government, as it has during the lifetime of the present Government, manufacturing output fell during the Labour Government while it has risen during this Government. That is the best possible tribute to the effectiveness of the Government's policies.

In contrast to what the hon. Member for Durham, North-West (Ms. Armstrong) said, does my right hon. and learned Friend agree that during this recession, unlike previous periods of economic downturn, the proportion of redundancies in white-collar jobs has risen considerably? Has my right hon. and learned Friend any thoughts on when he would expect an upturn in the service industries? What message would he wish me to give my constituents, who are suffering quite considerably?

I refer my hon. Friend to the survey that has been published by the Institute of Directors. The results show a remarkable turnround in the confidence of its members and provides extremely encouraging evidence that the turnround will come soon. I am sure that my hon. Friend will share my view that the most damaging thing that could happen to employment prospects would be the imposition of a national minimum wage, which would destroy up to 2 million jobs. If the hon. Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair) rises on this question, I hope that he will explain to the House how he would avoid the consequence that as the minimum wage is increased as a proportion of the average wage, the average wage in turn increases and we embark on a never-ending cycle of job destruction.

With unemployment increasing faster than in any other country in the western world, and when the summer will inevitably see a further round of closures, cuts and redundancies, when will the Secretary of State fight for his Department's budget? The money that is spent on training the unemployed is, in real terms, half what was spent when unemployment was last at 2 million. Or is it simply the case that the unemployed have become the forgotten people of this Government?

What a pity that the hon. Gentleman did not take the opportunity to answer the question that I put to him. Perhaps he thought that it was a sort of warm-up question that he was not obliged to answer. The hon. Gentleman put a statistic in his question—he has used it repeatedly in recent days—on my Department's budget. It is entirely untrue and entirely unfounded. I challenge him to produce the figures on which the assertion is based. We are producing a range of measures to help the unemployed back into work which is wider than that which has ever existed.