CORNWALL DATA

CLICK FOR LATEST ADDED December 2009 Sure Start Centres in Cornwall

In this ongoing post I shall bring together data about Cornwall from various sources so that they are more readily accessible: other data will be added to this current post and data will also be updated. Much is already posted at scattered places on this blog of course. All the data refers only to Cornwall and its parts (and sometimes includes and sometimes excludes the Isles of Scilly). Sources are given in square brackets; I have also included some website addresses, though these may change, so that you can explore the data for yourself. Explanatory notes with the original data are important for understanding.

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CLICK INDEX
Empty dwellings | Second homes | Average pay | Unemployment: JSA claimants | Pupil funding | Free school meals | Deprivation in Cornwall | Civil partnerships | Children born in Cornwall | Population of Cornwall | Pensioners in Cornwall | Land use in Cornwall | Cornwall MPs’ expenses and allowances | Landfill in Cornwall | School place appeals in Cornwall | Place survey 2008 | House repossessions | Housing waiting lists | GDP AND GVA | Miscellaneous | Cancer services | Sure Start

EMPTY DWELLINGS
There were 9012 empty dwellings in Cornwall at 6 October 2008
— Caradon 1588, Carrick 1604, Kerrier 1597, North Cornwall 1746, Penwith 1084, Restormel 1393 [Hansard 14 May 2009 columns 998W-999W].

SECOND HOMES
Cornwall (excluding Scillies) total 13 603 at October 2008
— Caradon 1813, Carrick 1917, Kerrier 1368, North Cornwall 4000, Penwith 2779, Restormel 1726 [House of Commons Library DEP 2009-1230, 27 April 2009, data is given for the five years 2004-2008].

In terms of numbers of second homes, North Cornwall is 7th out of 354 England authorities, Penwith 15th, Carrick 24th, Caradon 26th, Restormel 30th, and Kerrier 47th. These positions represent numbers of second homes not percentages of housing stock. The Isles of Scilly had 212 second homes in 2008.

AVERAGE PAY
£21 004 at April 2008
median, annual, gross, fulltime, all workers, by Cornwall and Scilly residence, at April 2008 [ONS, ASHE 2008, Table 8.7a].

There are various ways of measuring average pay, eg mean and median average, male and female and both, fulltime and part time, by place of work and by place of residence, by local authority and by constituency, weekly pay and annual pay. Figures for median average pay tend to be less than for mean average.

UNEMPLOYMENT: JOBSEEKERS ALLOWANCE CLAIMANTS
October 2009: 8336 (2.7 percent of the resident working-age population of Cornwall and Scillies). This is a rise of 232 over last month. In October 2008 the figure was 5381 (1.7 percent). The figure peaked in February 2009 at 10 220 (3.3 percent). [ONS]

The contribution-based jobseekers allowance (JSA) is £64.30 a week for people over 25 and £50.95 a week for people under 25. The jobseekers claimant count is not a measure of unemployment but of people claiming the benefit who must be, inter alia, available for work and actively seeking work.

This website gives details of jobseeker claimant counts over time for Cornwall:
https://www.nomisweb.co.uk/reports/lmp/la/1967128581/subreports/jsa_time_series/report.aspx

More data about the claimant count in Cornwall is here:
http://www.statistics.gov.uk/StatBase/Product.asp?vlnk=15084

These are general labour statistics for Cornwall and Scilly:
https://www.nomisweb.co.uk/reports/lmp/la/1967128581/report.aspx

The latest labour force survey data, a measure of unemployment, is for October 2007-September 2008: http://www.nomisweb.co.uk/reports/lmp/la/1967128581/subreports/ea_time_series/report.aspx

PUPIL FUNDING
The per pupil grant from central government for Cornwall school pupils is £3879 for 2009/10; the England average is £4218 (dedicated schools grant: indicative allocations to local education authorities).
[teachernet website of the DCSF]

Earlier funding data is here:
http://www.teachernet.gov.uk/management/schoolfunding/2006-07_funding_arrangements/

The dedicated schools grant (DSG) began in 2006/07 and earlier per pupil allocations are not directly comparable. Before 2006/07 schools were funded largely through the formula grant which, apart from the DSG, is the main grant from central government to local authorities.

FREE SCHOOL MEALS
Eligibility for free school meals is an indication of income deprivation and is an influence on educational achievement.

Percentage of primary and nursery pupils eligible for free school meals, January 2009:
England 16.0 percent
Cornwall 11.0 percent

Percentage of secondary pupils eligible for free school meals, January 2009:
England 13.4 percent
Cornwall 9.3 percent
[DCSF web page Schools, pupils and their characteristics; tables 11a and 11b in 'Local authority tables'.]
The website is www.dcsf.gov.uk/rsgateway/DB/SFR/s000843/index.shtml
The eligibility percentages for Tower Hamlets are 47.5 and 55.7.

The relationship of eligibility for free school meals and not gaining any GCSEs above grade D is given in DEP 2009-0918 of 19 March 2009 (Parliamentary Library).

Also see the data for deprivation below.

DEPRIVATION IN CORNWALL
There are several ways of measuring deprivation. The Index of multiple deprivation (IMD) is a major one.

The latest IMD measurements (2007) show Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly at 69th out of 142 ‘counties, cities, and London boroughs’ in England, where 1st is the most deprived. The IMD puts the Cornwall and Isles of Scilly primary care trust (CIOS) area at 74th out of 152 trust areas where 1st is the most deprived.

The IMD 2007 give these results for the former districts of Cornwall out of 354 districts in England, the score 1st is the most deprived: Penwith 36th, Kerrier 86th, Restormel 89th, North Cornwall 96th, Carrick 120th, and Caradon 156th.

IMD deprivation varies vastly across Cornwall and the measurements for 32 482 subwards in England which are available show this clearly.

See the IMD 2007 here.

The Health Observatory website here has some deprivation data for Cornwall too. Also look at the data above for free school meals in Cornwall.

CIVIL PARTNERSHIPS
Civil partnerships became possible in Britain with the coming into force of the Civil Partnership Act 2004 in December 2005. Between that date and the end of last year 307 people entered civil partnerships in Cornwall and Scillies: Table 5 of the Data by area of formation file on this ONS website.

CHILDREN BORN IN CORNWALL
The ONS published in August 2009 the latest details for England and Wales of the numbers of live births to mothers who themselves were born in the United Kingdom or born outside the United Kingdom in each of the eight years 2001-2008. The figures for Cornwall (excluding the Isles of Scilly), with much lower percentages than for England as a whole, for the first and last years of the series are:

2008: 5423 live births, 92.4 percent of which were to mothers born inside the UK
2001: 4463 live births, 94.5 percent of which were to mothers born in the UK.

The data is in tables 3a-3h on this ONS website which also gives separate figures for each of the former districts in Cornwall. [ONS]

POPULATION OF CORNWALL
The population of Cornwall in mid 2008 was 532 200. About 428 000 (80 percent) were aged eighteen or over. The full figures, including analysis for gender, ages, and districts, are in the Mid-2008 UK file on this ONS website . [ONS]

PENSIONERS IN CORNWALL
There are about 133 000 old age pensioners in Cornwall (males aged 65 and over, females 60 and over). The full figures, including for both the county and the former districts, are in the Mid-2008 UK file on this ONS website . [ONS]

LAND USE IN CORNWALL
Details of land use in Cornwall are available for the six former districts and for wards. The categories are given in square metres for domestic buildings, nondomestic buildings, domestic gardens, roads, rail, paths, greenspace, water, other, and unclassified. The tables are at Census ward levels GLUD 2005 tables . GLUD means Generalised land use database. An explanatory document of the GLUD statistics is here .

CORNWALL MPS’ EXPENSES AND ALLOWANCES
These are readily accessible at this Guardian website http://mps-expenses.guardian.co.uk/liberal-democrat/andrew-george. The last name in the url should be changed as appropriate to colin-breed, daniel-rogerson, julia-goldsworthy, or matthew-taylor.

The latest expenses/allowances, published December 2009, are available here, along with historic ones:
Cornwall MPs’ expenses

Again, change the last name to colin-breed, dan-rogerson (not daniel-rogerson as above), julia-goldsworthy, matthew-taylor.

LANDFILL IN CORNWALL
Cornwall 2007/08:
Total municipal waste 324 480 tonnes
Total municipal waste sent to landfill 210 386 tonnes (64.84 percent of total municipal waste)
The average proportion of municipal waste sent to landfill for the 121 unitary and waste disposal authorities in England was 54.42 percent.
[Hansard 26 October 2009 column 50W-54W]

SCHOOL PLACE APPEALS IN CORNWALL
In 2007/08 there were 277 appeals by parents against the non-admission of their child to their preferred primary school in Cornwall; 75 were successful. For secondary schools in Cornwall the figures are 405 and 151.

8183 children were admitted to Cornwall primary schools September 2007-January 2008 and 6514 to secondary schools in the same period.
[Department for children, families, and schools: here (scroll to table 3)]

PLACE SURVEY
A survey in 2008 by the Department for Communities and Local Government looked at people’s views of the locality and local services. Question 5 asked people how strongly they felt they belonged to their immediate neighbourhood. In the Cornwall area 66.5 percent said fairly or very strongly. This was 53rd out of 353 council areas, the largest percentage being at number 1.
[Department of Communities and Local Government Place survey 2008]

HOUSE REPOSSESSIONS
There was a total of 180 mortgage possession claims in Cornwall (unitary authority) in quarter 3 of 2009. This represents 0.8 households in every 1000 households and the total was a drop of 20 percent on quarter 3 of 2008. The figures for England were 23 205 mortgage possession claims, 1. 1 in every 1000 households, and a drop of 34 percent.
[Ministry of Justice12 November 2009]

HOUSING WAITING LISTS
There were 17 650 households on housing waiting lists in the six former districts of Cornwall at April 2008. In 1997 the number was 8043. The details from the Department of communities, by district and by years 1997-2008, are here.

GDP AND GVA
The latest GVA data for Cornwall was published by the ONS on 9 December 2009. Cornwall GVA perhead was £12 681 (in 2008, current basic prices, by workplace), which is 63.6 percent of the UK mean average. Details are in the Regional GVA statistical bulletin.

MISCELLANEOUS
Statistics for Cornish towns is a booklet produced by the Office of National Statistics (ONS). The revised version is dated September 2009. It contains data about deprivation, the number and size of businesses, unemployment, and population. Read it through the South West Observatory here.The South West Observatory website also has other data.

South West Regional Development Agency (SWRDA) has published in October 2009 Economic profile: issue 8 which discusses Cornwall’s economy in the recession on pages 20-25. Read it here.

CANCER SERVICES
The second annual report on some cancer services and outcomes was published by the Department of Health on 1 December 2009. It includes data for Cornwall and Isles of Scilly primary care trust and the Royal Cornwall Hospitals Trust (RCHT) on pages 29, 46, and 67.

SURE START IN CORNWALL
At the end of October 2009 there were thirty seven Sure Start Centres in Cornwall.
[ Hansard 14 December 2009 column 702W]

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General sources

ASHE Annual survey of hours and earnings (http://www.statistics.gov.uk/statBase/product.asp?vlnk=13101)

DEP Deposited parliamentary papers (http://deposits.parliament.uk)

Hansard (http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm/cmtoday/cmdebate/home.htm)

ONS Office for National Statistics

Teachernet (http://www.teachernet.gov.uk/docbank/index.cfm?id=12222)

A useful website for understanding local government language is: http://localgovglossary.wikispaces.com/
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PAY AND HOUSING IN CORNWALL

Original post 3 January 2009. Note on average pay in Cornwall added 30 April 2009.

The economic crisis hits many people in Cornwall (and elsewhere) hard. Look at just two aspects of life here. The mean average pay in Cornwall is about seventy five percent of the UK average according to the GMB trade union. ASHE data for 2008 suggests around eighty percent. County averages encompass a large range and also variations among different and smaller subareas but they can be useful and limited guides. House prices in Cornwall are high (with the same caveat about range and variations). Affordable housing thus matters to local people looking for a home.

Look a little more closely at housing and pay.

We need many more affordable houses to be built throughout Cornwall – to rent and to buy. The Labour government has failed appallingly over the last decade to push house building. It talked houses but little got built, affordable or open market. This isn’t likely to change now as finance and the economy seize up unless the government and local councils are pushed very hard. I fear the economic crisis is more likely to see the shortage of affordable housing in Cornwall continue.

In our low wage economy, Labour’s minimum wage has been a godsend to many in Cornwall. Now we are hearing arguments that the minimum wage should be frozen at the present rate during the economic crisis. Of course, the wage has to be affordable by employers, an unaffordable wage bill puts firms out of business or leads to firings, but I remember that the national minimum wage was brought in to a background of miswarnings about unaffordability and job losses, Tory opposition, and Liberal Democrat nonsense.

Happily, the local Liberal Democrats are now firm in their support for it. However, the Tories now seem to be ready to see the minimum wage end.

It is unacceptable that those at the bottom of life’s financial heap should suffer further and unnecessarily financially. Labour’s record on poverty is patchy with its disastrous abolition of the 10 pence tax rate and its inexplicable failure to take the poor out of income tax altogether, two kick-the-poor policies, on the negative side. There are welcome signals that the guilty government does not support a freeze on the national minimum wage.

The minimum wage is £5.73 an hour at present for those over twenty two; that is modest pay.

Here is how we give real recognition to the people of Cornwall in this economic crisis:

We should build many more affordable houses in Cornwall, social housing for rent and low-cost housing to buy, because many people here, who cannot buy on the open market, need them and building provides jobs and funnels money into the local economy. The minimum wage, a lifeline to many in Cornwall, should increase normally because industry and commerce can afford it, the wage funnels money into the economy, and the poor and low paid should never be held down but always helped up.

Note on average pay in Cornwall

I put below the median average pay taken from ASHE table 8.7a for 2008: it is the gross annual pay for fulltime workers based on residence by local authority area in Cornwall.

There are numerous figures for average pay: median average pay, mean average pay (higher than median because of some very large salaries), and median and mean figures based on workplace as well as on place of residence, fulltime or part time work, male or female workers, or all; and based on residence and workplace by local authority and by constituency; and of course pay that is not simply gross.

Average pay, eh?

Anyway, here are the ASHE figures for Cornwall for annual gross median average, residence-based by local authority, full time working, for 2008: £21 004. Divided by fifty two that’s about £404 a week.

As I’ve said at the beginning of this post and indeed often about statistics, the figures vary across Cornwall

Previous ASHE data is here.

ASHE: Annual survey of hours and earnings

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See here for an earlier post about the minimum wage in Cornwall

Additamentum:
See this Guardian article of 6 January 2009 about the low rate of construction.

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SOAKING THE POOR

About 48 000 households in Cornwall worse off

Labour argued for and introduced a 10 pence income tax rate because, it said, it was fairer to the low paid and would make work pay and thus be an incentive to work for the poor. I think in fact that the best way to help the poor would be to raise the tax free threshold and to cut regressive indirect taxes such as VAT, but Labour chose another, less efficient way. Nevertheless Labour did act on tax and also created a minimum wage to help the low paid.

In his 2007 budget Gordon Brown announced the abolition of the 10 pence income tax rate. The change comes into effect tomorrow.

Belatedly some more Labour MPs have just realised that this abolition will leave about 5.3 million households worse off. These are largely the households without dependent children and who do not have tax credits and who have incomes of between about £5400 and £18 500 a year. Way back in October 2007 the government gave its estimate to Frank Field of how many would be worse off and even said 900 000 of those had incomes below £10 000 a year – actually the number refers to the household reference person (Hansard 18 October 2007 column 1266W).

Field was on to this unfairness at the time of the 2007 budget and tried to get an impact assessment of tax changes on different groups and transitional arrangements if necessary for those on the lowest pay: his clause was rejected by Labour MPs though a handful of six Labour MPs and most Libdems voted for it, along with a few others (Hansard 25 June 2007 column 108 onwards). Julia Goldsworthy and Matthew Taylor both voted for Field’s clause and Dan Rogerson was a teller for it.

I can estimate how many households in Cornwall are adversely affected by the abolition of the 10 pence rate by comparing the number of households in Cornwall with the number in the UK and those adversely affected in the UK. This arithmetic suggests that suggests about forty eight thousand households in Cornwall are worse off because of the abolition of the 10 pence rate. As the proportion of low income households in Cornwall is greater than in the UK generally, the number affected is probably greater too.

Labour has done much, though nothing like enough, to help the poor since 1997 while keeping the economy sound and the bulk of the electorate on side. It has wrought a sea change since the barbarian days of the Tory governments 1979-1997. Things are now beginning to fall apart. It is difficult to understand this 10 pence tax policy. Labour is making a lot of low paid people worse off and doing it on purpose. Is this what people voting Labour thought they were voting for? How does this square with the minimum wage? This policy of soaking the poor is pitiable and shameful. The government should put its mistake right and ensure the low paid are not worse off.

PS The Conservatives officially abstained in the 25 June 2007 vote.

LOW PAID IN CORNWALL GET A KICK IN THE TEETH

Let’s be clear at the beginning. This is the policy of a Labour government we’re discussing.

Alongside the good news about the modest rise in the minimum wage is some bad news about the taxation of the poor.

From next month, when the income tax provisions of the last budget come in, the lowest paid will pay more income tax; the better-off will pay less. The budget abolished the 10 percent tax band and that’s the cause of the injustice. It means anyone earning less than about £19 000 a year will pay more income tax; people above that pay less.

People are liable for income tax when their work income reaches about £104 a week. People on very low earned incomes indeed will pay more tax.

Labour is rightly trying to reduce child poverty and, although progress is being made, this is proving difficult. The increase in the minimum wage will help. The loss of the 10 percent band and the consequent increase in income tax for those on low and modest incomes will reduce their take-home incomes and will worsen child poverty.

Disproportionate numbers of people in Cornwall earn low wages. This tax policy will make them worse off. The low paid in Cornwall are about to get a kick in the teeth from Labour.

I don’t know what, apart from socially unjust and stupid, you call a policy of taxing the poor more and the better-off less but I doubt it was what Labour voters thought they were voting for.

LOW PAID IN CORNWALL GET PAY RISE

The adult national minimum wage is to rise to £5.73 an hour in October. At present it is £5.52.

It is a modest rise but still unalloyed good news for low paid workers in Cornwall, the sort of practical real-life measure that benefits them. Since the wage was introduced in 1999 it has risen by fifty nine percent.

For 18-21 year olds the wage will be £4.77 and for 16-17 year olds £3.53.

The minimum wage is not profligacy and not generous but represents affordable economic justice, there is a good case for London having a separate and higher minimum, and the abolition of the ten percent income tax band last spring penalised the low paid unjustly; but the wage has succeeded in helping the low paid without increasing unemployment – contrary to what was direfully forecast before it was introduced.

Will you read of the rise in the national minimum wage on the nationalist and Libdem websites in Cornwall? Will they welcome it?

See a previous post about the minimum wage here .

CORNWALL UNEMPLOYMENT NOSEDIVES BUT LOW PAY PERSISTS

The Cornwall Labour Party blog draws attention to welcome progress in falls in unemployment here in Cornwall.

Since Labour came to power unemployment has fallen by about 9 400 in Cornwall. See here for the detailed data for each of the five Cornwall constituencies; it also explains how unemployment is measured.

The fall in the numbers of unemployed people in Cornwall constituencies is about two thirds overall. In the same period the fall in UK unemployment was 45 percent, significantly smaller than in Cornwall. The Cornwall constituencies are among the top tenth of most improved UK constituencies ranked by these percentages; we have made serious progress.

This good news seems to have been unrecorded so far by the Liberal Democrat and nationalist websites in Cornwall.

However, the Liberal Democrats here have acknowledged in Matthew Taylor’s words: “The fact is that the Cornish economy has started to turn round” since the dismissal of the Conservative government, though they claim credit for their Libdem efforts.

Of course, pay for workers in Cornwall remains problematically and stubbornly low and this is affecting negatively the lives and opportunities of many people. Progress is unacceptably slow.

Low pay also affects the funding of the NHS here and will be a factor in any move to reduce benefit levels, national pay scales, and the minimum wage in Cornwall. See this post and this on the blog.

In 2006 the median average gross pay for all fulltime, adult employees in Cornwall was £357.5 a week. This was 79 percent of the England figure of £453.3, a very modest improvement since 1997. Mean average pay is higher and so is median and mean average pay for males everywhere.

Again, even in the averages there is variety within Cornwall. The median pay (in 2006) for Penwith workplaces works out at about £2000 a year less than in Carrick.

See here for the ASHE income details.

THE MINIMUM WAGE IN CORNWALL

David B Smith, professor of business and economic forecasting at Derby University, has suggested that the national minimum wage should be revisited.

In an article for the Economic Research Council ‘Does Britain have regional justice or injustice in its government spending and taxation?’ he argues rightly that the economies of the regions of Britain differ and therefore the effect of the same government spending and taxes varies from region to region; and, contentiously, therefore that government interventions, including social benefits and the minimum wage, should vary to fit those differences.

The argument is that, for example, national-level unemployment benefits and welfare benefits in areas of high pay mean people are much better off in work than on those benefits; however, in regions with low pay those benefits may be a disincentive to work; indeed, government transfers of resources to less favoured regions may counterproductively discourage an enterprise culture. I think this is a telling argument and should be explored further.

However, I think it is not just a matter of regional economics; these are people’s lives and pricking the poor and ill to make them more economically productive is an ethically difficult project. There would have to be observable gains for individuals to make it acceptable. The effects of reduced benefits are likely to vary for individuals: for the able idle a cut might well get them into work. I am at a loss to see how a cut will encourage a drug addict or alcoholic out of his distress and into work; for him benefits are a response to his illness not a cause of it.

Smith also argues convincingly that the point at which the minimum wage is uneconomic, pricing out employment, varies from region to region. Those areas with high productivity and high living costs in relation to the average should get a higher minimum wage. And, conversely, the minimum wage should be cut in low pay, low productivity areas.

That means that in the southwest region, including Cornwall, the minimum wage should be cut.

At present the minimum wage is £5.35 an hour for an adult, say about £214 gross a week. I think knocking £15 a week off that in Cornwall and the southwest region is hardly likely to have any discernible effect on people’s behaviour except to make poor people poorer and heighten their perception of social injustice.

I agree there is a case for saying that in London, for example, the national minimum wage is too far low as it does not take into account the economic circumstances of life there; that is the regional injustice. Pay in many jobs already takes into account the noticeably higher cost of living in London. However, I disagree that the minimum wage should be cut from its present level anywhere. It is at a modest level and a cut would be a real-life injustice for working individuals.

I do not believe a modest minimum wage is in reality an economic monster. Yes, increases in it can have an effect on the viability of businesses and the ability of businesses to employ people. However, the government has been cautious and astute in increasing it and in consequence it has not so far damaged the economy. That is the way to go: affordable economic justice. There is also desirable social solidarity in a national minimum, the nation’s ad imissimum of earned wages. The early claims of Conservatives that it was an economic folly that would damage the economy and businesses and employment have proved unfounded and now the Conservative party support it, though that may be due to political realism as much as economic observation. Interestingly, the Liberal Democrats initially toyed with regional-level minimum wages rather than one of national uniform level.

Is anyone listening to Smith’s challenging arguments? The article ‘Gordon Brown to vary minimum wage over UK’ in the Sunday Telegraph for 22 July 2007 suggests that the Labour government is looking at regionalising the minimum wage, varying it from region to region or even locality to locality to reflect the realities of the local economy. That would be a major shift in economic and welfare policy. However, I think the title in the newspaper is bolder than the article which is somewhat indefinite.

It occurs to me that there is, of course, another possible and contentious change: the regionalisation of national pay rates, taking into account local pay in the private sector and the ease or difficulty of recruitment and retention of staff. The Cornishing of current national pay for professionals in, say, education, health, and local government would be downwards. Would it apply to Cornwall’s MPs?

See here for a post on average pay in Cornwall and (un)employment.

IS CORNWALL POOR?

There is a large range in deprivation and prosperity in different parts of Cornwall. The official statistics show that some parts of Cornwall are among the poorest in England but others are prosperous. In these circumstances generalised comments are limited in usefulness.

I put below details for Cornwall of some of the measures of deprivation.

Free school meals, education spending, and housing – see separate posts.

The official indices of multiple deprivation show that Cornwall districts are not the most deprived of the districts of England. In 2004 the districts were ranked thus in deprivation order (rank of average scores):

Penwith 56th out of 354 districts in England
Kerrier 87th
Restormel 93rd
North Cornwall 106th
Carrick 149th
Caradon 157th

On the sub-ward measures of multiple deprivation the most deprived sub-ward in Cornwall is part of Penzance East ward which comes in at the 819th most deprived out of 32 482 sub-wards in England; the least deprived in Cornwall is part of Saltash Burraton ward in Caradon which ranks 30 899th. (Sub-ward is officially called super output area, SOA, in these statistics.)

In the ranking of shire counties Cornwall and the Scillies in 2004 is the second most deprived after Durham; in the ranking of counties and cities and London boroughs Cornwall is 75th out of 149 in England (rank of average scores).

In all these deprivation statistics 1st is the most deprived; the lower the rank the worst the incidence of deprivation.

PAY
Updated 11 July 2007

The annual survey of hours and earnings (ASHE, ONS) for April 2006 gives the median average annual earnings of all adult fulltime workers; this is the most typical wage. In Cornwall this ranges from £17 400 in Penwith to £19 700 in Carrick (Table 7.1a, weekly averages annualised by me to the nearest £100). The Cornwall/Scilly median is £18 600.

These figures put Cornwall in the bottom part of pay leagues.

CHILDREN IN POVERTY

See the post on free school meals too.

In October 2006 the association of public health observatories (APHO) and the department of health published data about public health including the proportion of children in poverty, that is children living in low income households. These particular figure relate to 2001.

For Cornwall the figure was 19.9 percent. The district with the highest figure was Penwith at 24.8 percent. In comparison the figure for Liverpool was 45 percent and County Durham 25 percent.