According to Labour leader Ed Miliband, “Almost five million people in Britain aren’t earning enough for the living wage” — now £8.55 an hour in London, and £7.45 outside.
Those rates are estimated by the Greater London Authority (for London) and the Centre for Research in Social Policy (for outside London).
Even the Tories play lip-service to them. Labour should do more.
But Ed Miliband’s latest suggestion is that bosses be coaxed into paying these rates by offering them tax cuts if they do.
So that means service and benefit cuts elsewhere, resulting from the tax cuts, in order that the living wage can be nudged along without costing the bosses?
Inequality has been increasing in Britain since the Thatcher era, and is increasing even faster in the slump since 2008. The bosses should pay!
Labour should simply commit itself to raising the minimum wage to equal the living wage.
The Financial Times also notes: “Despite Labour’s warm words on the policy, not all Labour-run local authorities pay the living wage”.
