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Employment

My right hon. Friend is right that the new deal has had a fundamental effect on unemployment. It has reduced long-term unemployment by three quarters. As he says, unemployment was one of the scars left from the 1980s, which he remembers so well. The problem that would occur under the Opposition's policies is that they would have to cut programmes, slow welfare reform and reduce the help available to people, because they are against the extra money that the Government put in yesterday.