Sorry out of touch Tory MPs – we need a living wage

Since I was selected two months ago as Labour’s parliamentary candidate for Elmet & Rothwell, people have often asked me what  my opponent, the sitting Tory MP Alec Shelbrooke, is like. Usually, a reminder of his foul attempt to vilify people on benefits – through his private members bill which proposed introducing a welfare cash card to stop them buying “unnecessary items” – tells them all they need to know. But if one attack on some of society’s poorest people wasn’t enough, yesterday he hit a new low, as he spoke out against Labour’s proposals for a living wage.

For so many of us, Labour’s greatest achievement in government was the advent of the minimum wage. Yet when this policy was first introduced it faced fierce criticism from the Tory party, who claimed increasing wages would create inflation and as a result, people would be no better off. 15 years on, the Minimum Wage has been recognised as the most successful policy of the last thirty years – yet Alec Shelbrooke is using the same arguments, which have been unequivocally disproven.

In the face of a cost of living crisis, we need a living wage. The economic arguments for a living wage stack up – including the potential creation of 58,000 jobs as a result – and any politician who is remotely in touch with what real life is like for ordinary people can see for themselves why it is so desperately needed.

Wages have gone up at a slower rate than prices for 39 out of 40 of the months David Cameron has been Prime Minister; average wages are over £1,500 lower than they were when the Tories came into power in 2010; and in Yorkshire, where Shelbrooke’s seat of Elmet & Rothwell is, the average wage has fallen by almost 10% in the last 5 years.

However, one thing that’s abundantly apparent is just how out of touch this particular MP is. He voted for a tax break for the richest – yet he doesn’t think ‘hard-working people’ in his own constituency deserve to earn £7.65 an hour. He chose to use his private members bill to attack those on benefits, yet the majority of benefits are paid to people in work, to subsidise low pay – meaning a living wage would cut the benefits bill.

I’m proud that when Ed Miliband talks about making work pay, he desists from engaging in exactly the kind of  Daily Mail rhetoric of which Shelbrooke himself is so fond. Instead he talks about real solutions: affordable childcare, cracking down on zero hour contracts, and paying a living wage. Having spoken to hundreds of residents right across Elmet & Rothwell in recent weeks, I know just how well these policies are going down on the doorstep.

This weekend we’ll be out again, talking about Labour’s commitment to tackle to cost of living crisis, as Elmet & Rothwell Labour takes part in Labour’s National Day of Action on Energy Prices. If you’re in, or close to the Leeds area, why not come along and help us, as we lay bare to the residents of Elmet & Rothwell exactly whose side their local MP is on.

Veronica King is the Labour PPC for Elmet and Rothwell