Deepening Tory ‘wage pain’

Theresa May and the Tories’ ‘wage pain’ is leaving millions of people struggling to make ends meet.

Official figures out today (Wednesday 14 June) show a deepening wage squeeze.

Official labour market figures out today show that average earnings, excluding bonuses, fell in real terms by 0.6 per cent compared to a year earlier.

The figures follow an analysis by the London School of Economics of OECD data showing the UK had suffered the biggest drop in average wages between 2007 and 2015 of any developed country except austerity-ravaged Greece.

“Theresa May and the Tories’ wage pain is hurting workers in their wallets leaving millions struggling to make ends meet,” said Len McCluskey Unite general secretary.

“People are sick of the last seven years of the Tories always taking from those who need it most. With the government’s irresponsible Brexit stance creating economic uncertainty, their cap on the pay of millions of nursing, teaching and police staff, and inflation going rapidly in the opposite direction to pay, workers are under constant pressure to pay the bills and put food on the table,” he added.

These latest wage figures showed the weakest growth since October 2014 and the gap between pay rises and inflation has not been larger since August 2014.

“The Tories have succeeded in creating the longest period of falling real terms pay since the Napoleonic wars. They are clearly the party of economic mismanagement,” said Len.

“Last week, millions of working people rejected the Tories’ work harder for less approach. Only Labour will boost the minimum wage to £10 an hour, scrap the public sector pay cap and ensure working people can stand tall again by building an economy based on secure, decent jobs,” he added.

There has already been a sign of the squeeze affecting the wider economy, with retail sales slipping and overall GDP growth slowing to 0.2% in the first quarter of 2017 as consumer-facing industries see a slowdown.