• Elkie Dee Everyone needs money to pay for somewhere to live, to buy food and so on, don't they?
Labour politicians acknowledge that it's scandalous that so many people, many of them young, lack the money to afford these basic necessities. So why won't the Labour Party make a commitment to introducing a minimum wage for everyone, Including young people? What's so scary about the Idea that all people who work need a living wage? Quite a lot for Labour. The leadership of the Labour Party under Tony Blair are less interested in promoting soclal justice than they are in showing that they can manage capltalIsm better than the Torles. Ending poyerty pay through the introduction of a minimum wage would get in the way of this. Already Harriet Harman, Labour's spokesperson on employment, speakIng to the bosses organisation the CBI has stated that the Labour leadership will fight to exempt young people from the minimum wage so that bosses can explolt them as much as they choose. She suggested that new legislation could exempt employers from paying minimum wages to under 18s altogether and that an extra-low minimum wage could be developed for elther under-24 or 21 year oids. When Labour politiclans and trade unwage. Ion bureaucrats oppose the minimum wage, they claim they are concerned about unemployment, that Jobs would disappear. They even have the cheek to suggest this would be bad for young people, women, black people, and others who suffer from high unemployment and would lose their Jobs. Don't be conned by this kind of argu. ment. Because It Is a con! These arguments are used to defend the interests of the ruling rich, such as factory owners and those with thousands or millions of pounds Invested in the exploitation of capitalism, against those of the working class. These arguments are also used against the Interests of young people, black people, women, people with disabllities, all of whom are more likely to be in povertypay Jobs If they have them. These are the people who most need a minimum Many young workers In low-pald jobs are forced into them by government policles, for example, the DSS require. ment that people who sign on as unemployed must actively seek work and be willing to accept any work offered, even that £50-a-week cleaning Job. The bosses need someone to clean, and they want it done as cheaply as possible, as that leaves them more money to award themselves pay-rises. Working class people are told by the DSS that they don't have the right to seek to earn enough money to pay for the roof over their head and some food, even the odd night out. They don't have the right even to earn the pathetic amount they're given in Income Support, Housing Benefit etc. The Job Seekers Allowance now being Introduced by the government is going to make this even worse, as young people are bullied and intimidated further Into accepting poverty wages and any other conditions bosses wish to impose on their workers. It may be used to coerce people into scabbing against other workers on strike for better pay. Commitment to the minimum wage would create problems for a Labour Party who have no intention of reversIng years of welfare state cuts under Tory rule. The Job Seekers' Allowance Is almed at saving money on benefits by making people not eligible for benefit or forcing them into near-slave labour. A mintmum wage would make this harder, as It would make this policy designed to save money a lot less effective in achieving Its purpose. This is why campaigners for a minimum wage and against the Job Seekers' Allowance must link together to fight for a Labour commitment to the minimum wage and for Labour and trade union activists to take up these 2 closely connected struggles. These struggles need to include and fully involve everyone affected.
Get Active! To find out more about fighting low pay in your workplace, join a trade union. Look them up in the Yellow Pages.