The dole queues steadily lengthened throughout September, with almost 13,000 job losses announced by major employers in one two-week period alone.
Among companies shedding Just some of the major job losses announced in the last month:
BRITISH AEROSPACE ROLLS ROYCE DEFENCE RESEARCH AGENCY SEARS (Britain's largest shoe shop chain)
BRITISH COAL (and related enterprises)
PROPERTY SERVICES AGENCY IBM CADBURY NORTHERN TELECOM VSEL (shipbuilders)
ESSEX COUNTY COUNCIL BOULTON AND PAUL (Britain's largest joinery fim) NATIONAL POWER AND POWERGEN BIRDS EYE WALLS CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY TRAINING BOARD LONDON BUSWORKERS (Hanwell garage) BBC RESEARCH MACHINES (computer manulacturer) ITN (technical support and adininistrative staff) NESTLE ROWNTREE EASTERN ELECTRICITY TRAINLOAD FREIGHT GEC ALSTHOM MARINE PROJECTS (Plymoulh boalbulkers SUNBLEST BAKERY 3l (venture capitalists)
BUTTERLEY BRICKS YARDLEY LENTHERIC (perfume manufacturers) JOHNSON WAX workers were some key names in the crucial manufacturing sector. These included British Aerospace, the UK's largest manufacturing exporter, and Rolls Royce, where the company has slashed its workforce by 57 per cent in just two years.
With almost 108,000 redun3.000 2,500 2,000 1,800 dancies announced by June, this year's redundancy rate is set to top last year, which stood at 18 per thousand workers in spring 1991. Manufacturing was hardest hit, with a rate of 28.6 per thousand workers.
This was almost double the rate for the service sector (11.9 per thousand) which itself saw redundancies at more than twice their 1990 rate of 5.6 per thousand.
The haemorrhage of manufacturing jobs represents a serious blow to the economy and sets back any prospect of re overy. The ÚK's manufactur ing base has been devastated under the Tories, with manufacturing jobs slashed by 36 per cent to under 4.5 million since 1979. Over 2.5m workers in the sector have lost their jobs.
The car industry has been particularly badly hit by the current recession. In the last three years the UK car market has shrunk by 700,000 vehicles and one estimate puts job losses in the industry at around 70,000.
Unemployment has been rising steadily for the last two and a half years, with the official figure set to hit three million by the end of this year.
In August the official count of those out of work and claim9g benefit stood at 2016000e.
per cent of the workforce. This was a 47,000 increase on the previous month which was itself the highest July figure for five years.
Around a third of those out of All news is bad news: another engineer made redundant they return.
Although unemployment levels are highest in the North, the rate of increase over the last year has been greatest in the South. In the year to June, the rate rose by 32 per cent in the South East, 30 per cent in East Anglia and 28 per cent in Greater London.
The industrial collapse of the South is highlighted in a report by business analysts Dun and Bradstreet, which revealed that a quarter of the 46,000 companies which have collapsed so far this year were in the South East.
Young people are particularly suffering under the latest jobs onslaught, with under-25 year olds now accounting for around 30 per cent of the official unemshowed unemployment among under 25s to be as high as 17.4 per cent in july, compared with 10.8 per cent for the UK population as a whole.
Official statistics understate the real depth of joblessness in Britain today. The Tories have made over 30 changes to the way figures are compiled since 1979. Whole groups of unemployed workers, such as those under 18, have simply been removed from the register.
Sixteen and seventeen year olds are no longer entitled to benefit since they are expected to take up a place on a government training scheme.
Thousands of people have been intimidated and threat-