if
it's about Cardiff..
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An interesting finding is Cardiff seems to have done relatively well between 1997 and about 2003ish, with its level compared to the UK average growing from 102% to 110%. But since then, it looks to have done poorly, falling back to 102% of the UK average. I wonder why this is? Was there a lot of new development in the late 1990s / early 2000s? Is it something that wouldn't be obvious like declines in output at the steel works or some major factories?
Another interesting from looking at the rest of the country is that large parts of "affluent" regions have pretty low GVA. Look at Essex, Kent, Suffolk, Norfolk, East Sussex. Rather than the "South East" being wealthy it looks basically like London, the M3, M4, M42 and M11 corridors are wealthy, with the rest looking rather poor. Probably incomes look rather better than the GVA figures suggest though, because of significant commuting in to London.
The Valleys seem finally to have stabilised as well.
The areas around the corridors may have lower GVA but that is probably due to those residents commuting into and out of other areas with higher GVA.
Cardiff's GVA has probably decreased as a result of less public sector largesse after 2003. I doubt the increase was private sector led in any way. If correct it just shows how reliant we are here in Wales on English handouts - we provide the public services paid for using English taxes. When the shit winds finally arrive - when gorgeous George hands out the economic medicine that we so badly need - then we'll see just how resilient Wales is to having a smaller public sector. god help us.
Jantra. I don't think it was public sector led growth that boosted Cardiff between 1997 and 2003. Growth in Cardiff was rapid between 1997 - 2000 when public spending was basically not growing (this was the time of "prudence", and in the first few years of labour they really were prudent, sticking to inherited conservative spending plans that even the cons said they probably wouldn't have kept to). Public Spending did pick up in 2000 - 2003, but then continued growing pretty rapidly right through to 2009, a period when Cardiff was seeing relative decline. The timing is just wrong for this to be public sector led, unless we believe trends in public spending in cardiff are the opposite of those of the rest of the country (which is very unlikely to be true).
So I think this has to be private sector led, and I think manufacturing may play a role here. Things like the steel works, the docks, etc, not to mention all the plants down in Barry. And the late 90s, early 2000s did see good strong office take-up: we had some decent-sized investment projects such as Eversheds that brought some high paid jobs rather than the call-centre operators who expanded later.
Whereas the position of the valleys is broadly similar to the poorest performing parts of other regions of the UK, Cardiff is different. Whilst the best performing part of SE Wale, with a GVA/capita of ~102% of UK average, it significantly underperforms the best performing parts of other regions of the UK such as Belfast (149), Nottingham (125) Edinburgh (175) and Bristol (126) . Cardiff’s GDHI is also low in UK terms at only ~90% of the UK average . In fact when compared to other parts of the UK it seems the major economic challenge for SE Wales is as much to do with Cardiff’s underperformance when compared to leading towns/cities of the other regions of the UK as it is to do with economic inactivity in some Valley communities.
Devolution really didn't see a big influx of money into Cardiff. We already had what might be termed "administrative devolution" so the Welsh Office up in Cathays Park was full of civil servants managing health, education, local government etc. There might have been some expansion in the size of the service, but not enough to explain an 8% jump in Cardiff and the Vale's relative GVA. That was something like £540,000,000 (£540 million). At £30,000 a head, that would mean an extra 18,000 people beavering away because of the WAG being in Cardiff. That £30,000 is on the high side for the early 2000s and given a lot of low-level admin staff, and the 18,000 figure is clearly nonsense. Maybe a 1,000 or 2,000 at most, at probably more like an average of £22,000ish.. therefore explaining perhaps 1/10th of the relative increase, at most.
Some of the growth in 2000 - 2003 might be public sector, most likely to do with health and universities. But I think a lot of this was private sector driven. And the relative decline post 2003 is also most likely to be private sector driven.
Whereas the position of the valleys is broadly similar to the poorest performing parts of other regions of the UK, Cardiff is different. Whilst the best performing part of SE Wale, with a GVA/capita of ~102% of UK average, it significantly underperforms the best performing parts of other regions of the UK such as Belfast (149), Nottingham (125) Edinburgh (175) and Bristol (126) . Cardiff’s GDHI is also low in UK terms at only ~90% of the UK average . In fact when compared to other parts of the UK it seems the major economic challenge for SE Wales is as much to do with Cardiff’s underperformance when compared to leading towns/cities of the other regions of the UK as it is to do with economic inactivity in some Valley communities.
I’m as critical about the Welsh economy as anyone else, and especially so on the Welsh Government, but I think people must view todays figures as good news, as it appears the tide has turned, and before anything can dramatically improve, that had to happen.
I agree on the above point regarding Cardiff, but likewise, we perform better than other regional ‘capitals’.
Cardiff at 102.4 of the UK average outperforms Birmingham (95.5) Sheffield (85.0) Liverpool (97.7) Greater Manchester (86.8) and Newcastle/Tyneside (87.7).
Obviously the boundaries here are an essential part of the statistics, but it’s not really accurate to only point out the regional cities where Cardiff is doing less well against.
I also note that Cardiff outperforms Brighton, Essex, Outer London East & N.East and Outer London South. In addition, while Cardiff’s GVA share is higher than 1999, the likes of Bristol, Leeds, Greater Manchester, Sheffield, Birmingham are all lower. Bristol’s has fallen from 141.6 in 1999 and 132.4 in 2004 down to 125.3.
So, yeah, basically things are generally going in the right direction even if overall they aren’t anything to shout about.
I’m as critical about the Welsh economy as anyone else, and especially so on the Welsh Government, but I think people must view todays figures as good news, as it appears the tide has turned, and before anything can dramatically improve, that had to happen.
hang on a second. when the news is poor it always seems to be the fault of Westminster and the fact that whilst WG do have responsibility for economic development they have very little control over the Welsh economy. To be consistent in our approach, if it holds true that Westminster are responsible for the economic malaise then surely the same holds when things improve. Well done the Conservatives - the party that makes Wales a better place
I’m as critical about the Welsh economy as anyone else, and especially so on the Welsh Government, but I think people must view todays figures as good news, as it appears the tide has turned, and before anything can dramatically improve, that had to happen.
hang on a second. when the news is poor it always seems to be the fault of Westminster and the fact that whilst WG do have responsibility for economic development they have very little control over the Welsh economy. To be consistent in our approach, if it holds true that Westminster are responsible for the economic malaise then surely the same holds when things improve. Well done the Conservatives - the party that makes Wales a better place
you won't find me arguing with that. I always try to be a bit more reasoned with it all.
hang on a second. when the news is poor it always seems to be the fault of Westminster and the fact that whilst WG do have responsibility for economic development they have very little control over the Welsh economy. To be consistent in our approach, if it holds true that Westminster are responsible for the economic malaise then surely the same holds when things improve. Well done the Conservatives - the party that makes Wales a better place
Which is right, but again just like the recession wasn't all Labour's fault, the recovery isn't all down to the Conservative. Do we know what type of jobs these 15,000 people have had? Is it permanent or part-time? If it is part-time, we could be seeing more problems further down the line when Government handouts are truly squeezed.
Of the decline in unemployment, 10,000 was actually people moving into economic inactivity (i.e. not looking for work in the last 4 weeks), and 5,000 was people moving in to work. That said, prior to the latest quarter, economic inactivity had declined quite substantially, and employment had risen rather faster than unemployment had fallen.. so looking over a longer period, most of the decline in unemployment is into work..
