Bad figures and the BOE says it will get a lot worse

Unemployment now stands at 1.82m as at the end of September.

It is now at its highest rate for 11 years and currently 5.8% and September has seen the biggest rise in people claiming job seekers allowence since 1992 under John Major.

Employment minister Tony McNulty describes the figures as disappointing and his shadow Grayling says that the government has got nothing in its bag of policies in how to deal with it.

The second bit of bad news sees the Bank of England warning that the economy could shrink by 2% next year and inflation falling to below 1%,an unprecedented level for the UK.

If nothing else the forecast is quite a turn around from its August position in which it said 2009 was going to see flat growth shows how much the picture has changed since the Lehman Brothers collapse and the resulting financial turmoil.