The news today was of a fall in unemployment. Paradoxically, underlying this is an increase in JSA claimants. I’ve often said that JSA claims and unemployment are not the same thing, since many choose not to claim Jobseekers Allowance for a variety of reasons; they might be able to live off their own means or just be too proud. And some have that choice made for them because they are not eligible.

In Wandsworth 6,789 people (a claim rate of 3.3%) were claiming JSA in January, this is 195 (3% higher) than the previous month and 1,966 (40.8% higher) than the same time last year. This wipes out all the falls since October and is only 25 off being the highest figure since the recession began.

One unfortunate outcome of the recession is the rise in longer term unemployment. This is a lagging indicator, since, obviously, you can’t immediately be long term unemployed, but you can start to see the curves moving upwards in the 6 month and 12 month plus lines.

Depressingly those six and twelve month lines are likely to continue moving upwards and even now they make up just over half of all the claims (3,460 over six month compared to 3,329 under six months).

Category: Regeneration Tags: JSA, recession, Unemployment.
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The UK has finally left recession. As Gordon Brown repeatedly told us, we were one of the best placed economies to weather the storm – although quite how that tallies with being the last major economy to see growth and having the longest recession since current records began escapes me.

What is interesting to me, is how Jobseekers Allowance claims in Wandsworth appear (and I stress appear) to have followed economic growth. Previously there has been a lag, with unemployment increasing after the recession has ended. JSA is only a proxy for unemployment (many people who are unemployed choose not to claim, or are ineligible) but its recent plateau seems to mirror the plateau in the economy. Whether this is coincidence, or a sign that the nature of recessions has changed, remains to be seen.

It’s not a dynamic end to the recession – only 0.1% growth in the provisional estimate – but a positive sign.

Category: Regeneration Tags: GDP, Gordon Brown, Jobseekers Allowance, JSA, recession.
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There was an ever so slight fall in the number of Jobseekers Allowance (JSA) claims in Wandsworth last month with 47 fewer (a drop of 0.7% against last month) people signing on than in November.

A total 6,594 people were claiming JSA, a rate of 3.2%. This is an increase of 1,939 (41.7%) on the same time last year, although it’s worth noting that the recession was in full swing by then.

Wandsworth continues to perform well against London and the country as a whole.

Nationally the claim rate remains the same at 4.1%, but London wide the rate has dropped from 4.4% to 4.3%. The small fall in Wandsworth was not big enough to change the rate which remains at 3.2%.

What is interesting is how the rates seem to have plateaued for a few months now. In previous recessions unemployment (and therefore out-of-work benefit claims) has continued to rise for some time after the recession has ended as employers deal with the effects. Indeed, it may well continue to rise this time with people returning to benefit after season work has ended. Or it might just be that this recession is different. Only time will tell.

Category: Regeneration Tags: JSA, recession, Unemployment.
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Earlier this week I did a little analysis on the number of Jobseekers Allowance claims in Wandsworth and pointed out that while claims seemed to have plateaued nationally the trend was still upwards in Wandsworth. This week saw a drop of 172 claims (or 2.5%) in Wandsworth that perhaps gives some hope we aren’t going to continue the rise.

Claims are still up by 2,345 (or 54.6%) on this time last year. But the trend seems to be slowing (and maybe even reducing) and is holding up well against the London- and nation-wide rates.

Category: Regeneration, Wandsworth Tags: Jobseekers Allowance, JSA, recession.
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With the year drawing to a close, and hopefully the UK’s longest and deepest recession with it, I’ve spent a little time looking at how Wandsworth has coped.

I’ve repeatedly said that while Wandsworth isn’t immune to the effects of recession it is better placed than most to weather it.

The graphs below are various comparisons of Jobseekers Allowance claims. This isn’t a measure of unemployment (those figures aren’t produced for some months) since people can be unemployed without claiming JSA. And it isn’t the complete story; it ignores the take-up of other benefits and things like business failures or high street vacancies (Wandsworth has actually seen little change in these rates during the recession).

However, JSA can be a good indicator. So…

These graphs consider the period from January 2008 until October 2009, the represent (where appropriate) the highest rate in red, the lowest rate in green and Wandsworth in blue.

First up is a straight comparison between Wandsworth and the national rate of claims.

A good story for Wandsworth. Overall the gap between the lines has increased. In January Wandsworth’s rate was 0.4% below the national rate, it’s now 0.8% – overall JSA claims have risen less here than nationally, there would be about 800 more people signing on if we’d followed the national trend.

However, the past few months seems to show the national figure on a plateau, while Wandsworth has still increased a little. This may be because people who have lost their jobs in Wandsworth (which has a high proportion of people working in the financial sector) have been living off their own means before signing on, but that is just conjecture, the figures will need watching for a few months to see if the trend continues.

Next is a comparison between Wandsworth and the highest and lowest inner London borough rates.

Again, I think a good story. Wandsworth (the blue line) has the second lowest rate (Kensington and Chelsea, the green line). While our performance against them has deteroriated, we’ve seen the gap between us and the worst affected borough open from a 3% to a 3.5% difference so, proportionately, we’ve not been hit as hard as other inner London areas. And having the second lowest rate after Kensington and Chelsea is no cause for shame.

Finally, a comparison within the borough. This needs a slight caveat; the rates are calculated against smaller populations (the difference between thousands in a ward compared to 100,000 to 200,000 in most boroughs) so the rates can fluctuate more. However, over the period it shows a fairly clear pattern.

The story here is not so good. While we haven’t been as badly affected as some parts of the country those differences are reflected within Wandsworth. Ideally the rate of change would be the same, indicating a borough that is relatively cohesive. However, the gap between highest rate (Latchmere, in Battersea) and bottom (Thamesfield, in Putney) has widened from 3.5% to 4.4%. This is not an ideal situation and suggests some parts of the borough, because of poor transport links, access to employment opportunities or education and training are suffering more than than other parts. Exactly why things like the Employment and Skills Partnership are needed to target public resources to address those imbalances.

Overall, I think my repeated comment that Wandsworth has not been hit as hard as elsewhere has been true. And even Wandsworth’s worse wards haven’t been affected as badly as, say, Tower Hamlets or Hackney. But it does bring home that just performing better than elsewhere is rarely a cause for complacency.

Category: Regeneration Tags: Jobseekers Allowance, JSA, Latchmere, recession, Thamesfield, Unemployment.
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We are now in the longest recession this country has suffered.

No political points. The recession continues, unemployment goes up.

Last month we saw a small drop in Jobseekers Allowance (JSA) claims, this month’s increase more than wipes out the drop.

Overall there was an increase of 140 JSA claims this month, a 2.1% rise. There are now 6,813 people signing on, an increase of 2,768 (or 68.4%) over the year.

And that’s just in a year. We haven’t seen any growth in the economy since 2007. The increase in JSA claims since then is 82.1%. It’s hard to see the benefits of our economy being ‘well-placed’ for this recession.

Category: Regeneration Tags: Jobseekers Allowance, JSA, recession, Unemployment.
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The winner? The iconic Power Station building in Nine Elms

This week was a story of two regenerations – with two very different results.

Recession kills off Roehampton regeneration
The bad news came for Roehampton. The Roehampton Regeneration had been moving slowly for several months while the planning application was developed and everyone was aware that the economic climate meant that rapid progress was unlikely. Unfortunately the recession has been record breaking – the longest this country has seen. And it is now apparent that even after the recession ends it will be some time until we would be able to find a developer who would make Roehampton a priority. It is a disappointing, but unavoidable, decision.

Nine Elms planning framework discussion starts
And as if to balance the bad news from Roehampton the other side of the borough saw the launch of the Mayor’s consultation on the Opportunity Area Planning Framework. It was a real boost for the area and represents huge ambition for Nine Elms. Perhaps best (and I failed to mention this in my original post) was the exemption of the area from the Crossrail level to enable investment in transport – especially a Northern Line extension.

Of course, as much of the work of the council will be about making sure the whole borough – including Roehampton – benefits from the good news in coming years.

Category: London, Regeneration, Weekly report Tags: Crossrail, Nine Elms, Northern Line, Queenstown, recession, Roehampton.
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No facelift: The recession has put paid to plans for improvement

The recession has finally put paid to hopes for a major regeneration project in Roehampton.

The scheme had been in development for a number of years and went through seemingly endless consultations with local residents, mixed feelings from the Labour Party (who couldn’t work out if they want to improve people’s quality of life or not) and an extensive period of work preparing for a planning application.

The plan would have seen improved social housing, a landscaped and usable ‘village green’ and overall lower building heights. Most important was the creation of employment in the area through the improvement of business units and provision of a supermarket.

Roehampton suffers a much higher rate of unemployment than the rest of the borough (in September the rate of JSA claims was 4.4% in Roehampton, against 3.2% in the borough as a whole). The picture is much worse when considering working age benefits; nearly one-in-five Roehampton residents are claiming a benefit (19.4%), almost twice the rate of the borough as a whole (10.9%).

But while supermarkets were keen – only Asda didn’t express an interest because of the proximity of an existing store – funding the overall regeneration has been looking less and less unlikely.

While Gordon Brown was promising we were well-placed to weather the recession we’ve suffered more than many comparable countries. And while he said we would be coming out of recession quickly our economy is still shrinking while other nations are back in growth.

We’ve just seen the sixth-successive quarter of decline in Gross Domestic Product (GDP), and while the overall situation may be improving this isn’t the case for every industry – construction has been hit far harder than most. In the 18 months we’ve been in recession the overall drop in GDP has been 6.9%. In the construction sector that drop has been 15.6%.

So while the news in Nine Elms has been optimistic – fuelled by the location, investment by the US Embassy and relative ease with which the area can be developed – Roehampton, unfortunately, has none of those advantages and that, along with the high proportion of social housing included, meant that to interest a developer the council would have had to subsidise the scheme to a level that it just cannot afford.

Rather than have a scheme on ice waiting for a lengthy recovery to help we are now going to have to concentrate on the other elements of help we are providing Roehampton, like support for local businesses and targeted help to get people back in work. But it is frustrating to have got to this stage to see the plans be killed by factors outside of the council’s control.

Category: Regeneration Tags: construction, development, Nine Elms, recession, Roehampton.
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The growth in unemployment slowed nationally, but in Wandsworth it fell slightly in September. Not much, just 43, but that’s still a fall!

Overall there were 6,673 people claiming Jobseekers Allowance in Wandsworth in September. A fall of 43 (0.6%) on the previous month. Of course that is dwarfed by the steady increase in previous months. The total is still some 2,711 (68.4%) higher than this time in 2008.

Of course, small fluctuations are not much to get excited about, but so far they have tended to be favourable to Wandsworth. I’ll repeat my mantra: Wandsworth isn’t immune to recession, but is doing a lot better than many places during it.

Category: Regeneration Tags: Jobseekers Allowance, JSA, recession, Unemployment.
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Dried (and presumably ornamental) fruit at the Old York Road Fun Day

Old York Road Fun Day
I popped along to the Old York Road Fun Day last Sunday. The last (I think) of this year’s street party style events supported by the council and town centre partnerships. A fantastic day and definitely bigger and better than previous years. Congratulations to all involved in organising it.

Labour Party conference
There is no doubt that the Labour Party conference has dominated the news and politics for the past week.  To me it seemed they had a promising start.  The issue of Gordon Brown’s alleged medication needs turned into sympathy for the Prime Minister and there were some good early performances by key ministers in his government.

Unfortunately it turned bad with the Prime Minister’s speech, that – I believe – wasn’t enough and certainly left The Sun thinking it was time for change. Whether The Sun’s decision proves a motivator for Labour Party activists remains to be seen, but I can’t help but think Brown missed his best opportunity to remedy his dire situation.

Business Support
Last night I attended the last of our business support seminars which have been running around the borough to provide help and advice to businesses during the recession.

The event provided local businesses the opportunity to hear from professionals from the world of property, tax and insolvency and to network and mingle with them and other business support services afterwards.

Despite the recession I have real pride that Wandsworth is a business borough. While most of the credit for this belongs to the businesses, I can’t not point out the work that the council’s Economic Development Office do in supporting businesses, assisting new businesses to start or set-up in Wandsworth and make sure the council is as business friendly as possible.

Category: Politics, Regeneration, Weekly report Tags: Gordon Brown, Labour Party, Old York Road, Power Station, recession.
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