Oh how Governments would love it if the national statistical office (ONS) wasn’t independent. Today has been a shocker for New Labour, and while the usual serial lies have emanated from press rooms in Party and Government, nothing can truly hide our situation for much longer.

Perhaps in an attempt to keep people from bothering them with too many questions, the ONS pours forth a torrent of information on a more or less daily basis. It costs a lot more than the Met Office to run, but then it is also a lot more accurate. Some of the outputs, however, are more interesting than others: the horticultural census, for example, isn’t much of a bodice-ripper. And the same is usually true of regional statistics.

But regional employment statistics are very enlightening indeed. Especially when you look at those of working age who are inactive as opposed to the more narrow term ‘unemployed’.

Nearly a quarter of the working-age population in Wales and the North East does no work. And the same is true for 20% in both parts of the Midlands and the North West.

These are the areas first of all ruined by Thatcher’s anti-Union revenge, and then neglected by New Labour. A left-of-centre Government preferring City banker earnings to those of real people is the biggest single reason why I don’t describe myself as left of centre any more. And so being more of a rightist anti-Statist Untory these days, numbers like these being paid by the State remind me just how bad the dependency culture is in Britain. Here’s two more ONS statistics that make my teeth grind.

10% of the adult population are on State Pensions, and a further 1 in 5 work for the Government.

That leaves just half the country engaged in private sector work. But unfortunately, retail and UK-only production and distribution accounts for somewhere around 1 adult in 7.

So under a third of those in commercial work are actually engaged in ensuring Britain pays its way in the world.

As white collar people used to recite over and again in the 1950s, “The trouble with this country is that one works while two watch”.

Some things never change.