Last updated 11:26, Wednesday, 12 November 2008

Today’s unemployment figures make grim reading. Nationally the picture is the worst it has been for more than a decade and there are few signs of it brightening.

Yesterday announcement of more than 5,000 job cuts gave the harshest indicator yet that recession’s bite was deeper and more painful than many dared fear when global economies wobbled through stock market confidence loss and nervousness in banking systems.

And while previous experience shows that tinkering with interest rates and massaged inflation levels are entirely possible, the effects of soaring unemployment are unavoidably cruel.

Unemployment is now rising at more than a thousand a day, according to TUC general secretary Brendan Barber. Every lost job represents a human story of hardship, anxiety, debt, mortgage arrears, repossession.

Job losses which started in the construction industry are now being felt in finance and manufacturing. Expectation is that knock-on effects will lead to more job losses in retail, hotels, leisure, service industries – none can count on escape from the impact of severe downturn.

Gordon Brown remains determined to borrow to inject money into the economy. His critics accuse him of stacking up more pain for later. Their point is well made but since they too have run out of ideas, that’s almost immaterial.