Jersey unemployment figures no help to us
IN REFERENCE to the letter which was printed in the Guernsey Press from Graham Guille and Gloria Dudley-Owen. In this letter statistics were given in regards to the unemployment rate in the island of Jersey as a way of fulfilling a point of view about the overpopulation in Guernsey. However, if you look at these figures they give you nothing whatsoever to base any form of forward planning upon.
We were advised that the population of Jersey is over 100,000 people, with 1,280 people seeking employment, which on the face of it would mean that Jersey has the lowest unemployment rate of any other country or state on the planet. Some countries in Europe have an unemployment rate of 25% plus.
Perhaps if the real figures had been given, such as the exclusion of people below the age of 18 and over 65, and the amount of people classified as long-term unemployed, the details given would have made a stronger case for discussion.
Perhaps it is not the number of people being brought into the island to fill positions that need filling that needs to be addressed, but the education system within this island that results in the necessary importation of doctors, nurses, teachers, dentists, hotel and restaurant workers and health care staff.
There are always a number of people who will raise the question of why it is that so many people are needed to fill the amount of licensed positions which could be done by locals, but with an unemployment rate of approximately 370, the filling of all licence workers' roles would be impossible.
JONATHAN RUTHVEN,
Flat 11,
Les Gravees Court,
Les Gravees,
St Peter Port,
GY1 1RL.
