At least 2m unemployed this Christmas
Some are already predicting it will reach 3m before the recession has run its course; the gloomsters include David Blanchflower, the Bank of England's labour market specialist (so he should know!), and several City forecasters.
If it does reach 3m then this will be significantly worse than the legendary 3m of the Thatcher years because now it would be 3m on top of the 3m-4m who are of working age but living on various benefits, excluding unemployment benefit. This would be a scary number of people without a job and depending on welfare payments.
Yet the politics of this are still not going the Tory way. The latest ICM poll shows Labour still cutting into the Tories' lead. In just over a month the gap between the two parties has narrowed from 15 points to five. Significantly, the Tories have fallen below the benchmark 40% to 38% (down seven points on last month) while Labour is up three points to 33%. This places the ICM poll in what this Blog called on Monday the "new poll consensus", which gives the Tories a lead of around five or six points -- something any government could live with in mid-term.
So plenty to talk about on the programme today with Neil Kinnock and Michael Heseltine. We'll look at one industry particularly badly hit by the downturn - motor manufacturing. We're told Peter Mandelson is drawing up a package to help the sector. With a huge fall in sales and thousands of jobs on the line, how far should the Government intervene?
Our bad news comes as the US Federal Reserve slashes interest rates effectively to zero and President Elect Barack Obama warns the country is running out of 'ammunition' to avert a deep recession. The Fed has also announced it will indulge in some "quantitative easing" ... ie pumping a lot more money into the system. We'll be looking at whether Britain will be following suit.
Also on the show today, a as a ministerial aide decides to go over Lord Mandelson's plans to part privatise the Royal Mail. We've got the latest.
Gordon Brown arrives in Baghdad to meet the Iraqi Prime Minister. He confirms . We've got the details.
While the PM is abroad, it falls to his party deputy Harriet Harman to field questions in the last PMQs before Christmas. We'll have all the debate live, with expert analysis from the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ's political editor Nick Robinson. We'll be keeping an eye out for signs of Labour party rebellion over the planned part-privatisation of the Royal Mail, and looking at whether favourable opinion polls could be tempting Mr Brown to go for a snap election in the New Year. We've also been taking a look at the divisions in Cabinet over Heathrow expansion.
And last but not least, we'll be joined by legend of stage and screen, star of the Carry On films and many others, Leslie Phillips. He's fed up with cyclists - and wants the Government to introduce a permit system for anyone riding a bike.
It's the last PMQs of the year and we're live from 11.30 on ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ2 this morning. Hope you can join us.
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