Living Wage

Jack Dromey Excerpts

Thursday 6th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Jack Dromey (Birmingham, Erdington) (Lab)]

On Monday, at the launch of living wage week in Birmingham, a young apprentice, Ben Jordan, walked up to the platform with a bounce in his step and a smile on his face, and told the story of what life was like on the minimum wage in his previous job and what life was now like on the living wage, working as an apprentice for Unity Trust bank. He said, “Before, I had to work seven days a week. I never had a weekend off. I struggled to see my friends or to go to see my football team. Now, I have a better standard of living and I’ve got time off at the weekend. I cannot tell you what that has meant for me.”

The event in Birmingham was remarkable and Citizens UK is a remarkable organisation; we had all the faiths and those of no faith. We had imams quoting from the Koran and Catholics quoting from the Bible, but everyone was making the moral case for the living wage. We had several of the 100 employers who have now signed up to the living wage; these are accredited employers in Birmingham, including the Witton Lodge Community Association, in my constituency. Crucially, the council is involved, including its deputy leader, Ian Ward. I am proud to say that the first thing the new council did in 2012 upon being elected to office was to introduce the living wage for all its directly employed employees. Subsequently, it introduced it for those working for schools and now ours is the first council in the country to insist that in future all contracts for care will be let on the living wage. As he has said, “Why is it that, historically, we have paid the least to those who care for those we value the most?” On Monday, we also saw an ambitious objective being set: 100 employers now is to become 1,000 employers this time next year. But we are an ambitious city and that is what we will achieve, not least because more and more employers are speaking out and saying, “This is right and it makes good business sense.”

In a previous debate on low pay, I referred to the fact that I am proud to have been a founder member of the drive for the living wage in London, working with what was then called TELCO—the East London Communities Organisation—and subsequently called London Citizens. I ran the union’s organising department. At first, we had 10 organisers—ultimately we had 12—who were cleaners themselves, and they were organising 4,000 cleaners in Canary Wharf and the City of London who were cleaning the boardrooms and toilets of those earning millions when they themselves were on the minimum wage. We also organised the cleaners of the House of Commons, and that led to the first strike in the history of the House of Commons, in order to win the living wage. I am delighted that now, under your leadership, Madam Deputy Speaker, and that of the Speaker, the House of Commons is an accredited living wage employer, so setting an example to the rest of the country.

Through that experience I saw at first hand just what life was like on the breadline. I met the cleaner who said, “I have to do three or four jobs from Canary Wharf. I sleep on the bus from one job to the next. I never see my kids.” I met the cleaner here in the House of Commons who, when we were going outside during the campaign to win the living wage, said, “I’d prefer not to, Jack.” When I asked why, he said, “I don’t want my community—my people—to know that I am but a minimum wage cleaner.” More recently, I sat down with three women in the Erdington food bank, two of whom were on the minimum wage. One said, “I am trying to bring my kids up. I work hard, day in, day out, but it is so tough for me because I am on the minimum wage. Jack, for me, it is not a life. I simply exist.”

The case for the living wage is overwhelming. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington (Chris White) for initiating this debate, in which we have heard some thoughtful contributions from across the House, including those from the hon. Members for Newark (Robert Jenrick) and for Bedford (Richard Fuller). We need to make the argument with force. First, the living wage is right for the worker, as it is about dignity at work. Secondly, it is right for the worker’s family, because it is about giving the worker more time to spend with their family. Thirdly, it is right for the taxpayer. We have nearly 120,000 working poor in Birmingham who have to claim housing benefit to pay their rent, because they are on low wages. Fourthly, it is right for the local economy. Low-paid workers who earn more spend their money locally, and that helps to boost local economies. Fifthly, it is right for the employer. All my experience in the trade union movement tells me that the living wage reduces turnover, induces greater co-operation, facilitates greater productivity and reduces absenteeism. Some employers I have met have been initially reluctant to take on board the concept of a living wage, but when they have seen it work in practice, they have said, “The living wage is good for business.”

Action is necessary, not least in the city that I am proud to represent. One in three women in Erdington earns less than the living wage—in the midlands, the figure is one in four. But progress is now being made. It is how we drive it forward to the next stage. I welcome the Labour Front-Bench team’s proposals, which include not only incentivising employers to introduce the living wage but using public procurement power. It is crucial that we give a clear lead on the matter, because this is also about the kind of country that we wish to live in. Do we really want to live in a country where workers sleep on the bus between jobs and where workers never see their families? Those workers pay a very heavy price for existing on poverty pay.

In conclusion, let me pay tribute to those pioneers of the living wage—the remarkable people of TELCO, London Citizens and now Citizens UK—because they have served this nation well. Crucially, we want a great national will that says that we do not want to live in a country characterised by poverty pay. Our country best succeeds on the basis not of a low wage, low productivity economy but of a high wage, high productivity economy.