Why you need a sliding scale of wages PORT TALBOT AGAINST E.C. AND B.S.C
Socialist Press1977 1977-04-27Read it in the scan (PDF), scan page 5 →
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If Phase 2 is not broken then by July the annual fall will have gone up to about 10% (or 9% if Healey ever brings in his conditional tax cuts).
But horrlying though it is, that is not a full measure of the price of the Social Contract.
The cut in real take home pay trom the highest point that it reached before the Labour government brought in its pay controls has so far been 14% and by July if Phase 2 is not broken it would be 19%.
This means living standards cut by one-fifth-that is the record of the last 2½ years of Labour government.
But even that underestimates the effect of the government's policies on standards of living because it refers only to workers who are employed.
UNEMPLOYMENT
The growth of unemployment under the Labour government to nearly 17½ million means that those working class families hit by unemployment have suffered a drop in living standards of much more than these figures show.
And all workers are hit additionally by the deterioration of the social services like health and education.
These figures suggest the very minimum wage demands which should now be taken up by the labour movement. • First of all just to restore real pay to the level it had already reached before the Social Contract, it would be necessary to get increases now on average of 17-18% The GMC of Portsmouth CLP has passed a resolution which indicates the kind of support which is building up or a turn to a programme which can defend the rights and conditions of workers.
"This CLP condemns the coalition deal with the Parliamentary Liberal Party:
We call on the NEC to convene a special conference of the Party to discuss a programme of socialist policies on which to fight a General Election and to elect a leadership to fight on that programme"
The resolution, which now goes the NEC, must become the start a campaign in the Labour Party force the lefts on the committee make a stand on this question.
t of this campaign should be a hu of the meting where the FORTA END T 3.65: