James Moore: Britain's best off backing lemmings

Outlook It is scant consolation that many economists were expecting worse from yesterday's jobless figures. The numbers are truly horrible, with UK unemployment increasing by 281,000 to 2.38 million. The chill of those figures also mask what are tragedies for many of the individuals behind them.

The number of those tragedies is also rising at the fastest rate since the Thatcher recession of the early 1980s, and there is worse to come. Over the next few months, thousands of school leavers and university students will join them. They could be forgiven for asking "was it really worth it?" when they start attempting to put their educations to use and realise that there is no way of doing so.

The figures would have been even more unpleasant were it not for Gordon and Alistair's cavalier approach to Britain's yawning budget deficit. All their extra spending is easing the pain, although the crutch it offers is going to break sooner or later (probably sooner).

However, while it might not provide much comfort to those trudging down to JobCentre Plus, or whatever it is they call it these days, it could actually be much worse. There are places in Europe where 3.5 million people out of work – which is what we are likely to have when unemployment peaks some time next year – would be seen as a real result.

It is only now, in the depths of the worst downturn in living memory, that the benefits of Britain's relatively flexible labour market, compared to our competitors on the Continent, will fully be realised. True, companies on this side of the Channel find it much easier to fire people, but that also makes it easier for them to hire, and they are also more willing to hire because they know that if they have to swing the axe they can do so.

Contrast this with the situation in France, where the long-term unemployment rate during the good times was higher than the 7.6 per cent we have now. Of course, while British unions stage colourful protests and take lemmings along to company annual meetings (as they did at British Airways on Tuesday), French protests have real teeth. Telecoms workers at Nortel Networks took things to a new extreme this week when they threatened to detonate 12 gas cylinders at their plant in Châteaufort, west of Paris.

Previously, the favoured French method of extracting better redundancy terms was simply to kidnap executives for a few days. If the demonstrations prove to be effective, any victory will be pyrrhic because the protesters' message will be heard loudly and clearly in boardrooms, and it will be heeded when it comes to deciding where to locate future employment opportunities as things get better.

Far better to take the pain on the chin and jump up and down with all the lemmings.