THE government's crusade for full employment has been strengthened by shocking statistics about the impact on people's health of being out of work, the work and pensions secretary said yesterday.

Work and pensions secretary Peter Hain told a conference in London that being unemployed is bad for the health of parents and their children.

He said the notion that life without work is stress-free was wrong.

A recent study showed that the death rate for children of parents who had never worked or were long-term unemployed was 13 times that for the children of professional employees, according to Mr Hain.

"Also the prevalence of psychiatric disorders among children in families whose parents have never worked is around five times greater than those with parents in professional occupations.

He said: "While the rates of deaths from injury and poisoning in children have fallen in England and Wales over the last 20 years they have not for children in families in which no adult is in paid employment.

"This is shocking and underlines for me even more starkly why our crusade for full employment in our generation is so important," he added.

Mr Hain told the conference, organised by Child Poverty Action Group and One Parent Families, that the government was right to do what it could to help long-term benefit claimants, including lone parents, to get a job.

He added: "It is also right for us to expect people to take advantage of that help for their families' sake."

Director of Bournemouth based commercial recruitment agency SOS Chris Cook agreed, but added: "To succeed it is important for jobseekers to have the right personality, commitment, and values.

"A positive environment at home helps enormously because it fosters aspiration and more careers advice could be given in schools too.

"Young people need positive people around them and if there's negative energy in a household that will wear down a young person.

"But if there's positive energy it will rub off.

He added: "As soon as youngsters leave school they can choose their careers.

"We've recruited for over 50s insurer RIAS, Portman and now Nationwide - where young jobseekers have started on low salaries and they will have gone through the ranks and should be earning attractive salaries.

"There's no doom and gloom in Bournemouth - my clients are expanding.

"Admittedly the commercial environment is different to the industrial but the businesses I work with are evolving.

"There are so many great local employers. An example is RIAS which in 2001 had 300 staff and now has about 1,400," he concluded.