 With the advent of the Great Depression, employment within the Rhondda Valleys continued to fall. This in turn led to a decline in public and social services, as people struggled to pay rates and rents. One of the outcomes of a lack of funds was a fall in health provisions, which in Rhondda lead to a lack of medical and nursing staff, a failure to provide adequate sewage works and a rise in deaths from tuberculosis. By 1932 the long-term unemployment figure in the Rhondda was recorded at 63 %, and in Ferndale the unemployment figure for adult males rose as high as 72.85 %.
