Unlike the Tories, Labour has a plan to create an economy that works for working families

Yesterday’s news of a fall in unemployment is welcome, but behind the headlines there’s another story to tell. The reality is that millions of working people in Britain are in jobs that don’t pay enough for them to provide for themselves and their families. That is the legacy of this government: a low-wage, low-skill economy where for too many work doesn’t pay.

Figures Labour has released today to coincide with Fair Pay Fortnight show that since 2010 half of all new jobs created have been in low-paid industries. For women, the picture is particularly bleak. 60% of the growth in jobs for women during this period have come from jobs in low-paying industries, compared with 39% for men. And we know there are now 1.4 million women and men working on zero hours contracts.

Despite promising to make work pay, all this government has offered an increasing number of working people is low pay and insecurity, making it almost impossible for them to pay the bills and put food on the table. While those at the top have seen their pay go up and up and their taxes cut, working people are £1600 worse off now than when David Cameron came into office. His economic plan is protecting those at the top and failing the working people that are so crucial to this country’s prosperity.

Labour has a better plan. We will build an economy in which everyone who puts in the hours at work can support themselves and raise a family without having to rely on benefits to cover the rent. We will raise living standards, and make work pay.

A Labour government will increase the National Minimum Wage to £8 an hour by 2020, putting £3,000 a year more in the pocket of a full time worker on the minimum wage.

And we’ll do more to promote the Living Wage, which the TUC and others have been fighting so hard for, and which Fair Pay Fortnight is promoting this week. Labour councils from Lewisham to Preston have led the way in becoming living wage employers, boosting the pay of the canteen staff, cleaners and school support workers who are the fabric of our communities.

In the private sector, more than 1,000 companies including 21 in the FTSE 100 have worked closely with trade unions and have committed to pay their workers a living wage too. Labour will introduce Make Work Pay contracts that would encourage more employers to do so, by giving each one that signs up to pay the living wage a tax rebate to invest in their business and their staff, while also saving taxpayers money by the reduced social security payments for people in work.

So instead of jobs in low paying industries growing faster than those in other industries, as we’ve seen under this government, we should be aiming for growth in high paying jobs to be outstripping that in lower-paid jobs. That’s why Labour’s plan is to halve the number of workers on low pay by 2025, while creating a million more jobs in high technology green industries. This week Ed Miliband announced plans for more training and apprenticeships, and investment in innovation and infrastructure, to create the high-wage, high-skill economy Britain needs to see.

But it’s vital that both men and women can play their part and access jobs that allow them to fulfil their potential. Too often, families and particularly women are held back by the crippling cost of childcare. And its childcare costs that eats up so much of their wages, making it that much harder for them to make ends meet. That’s why a Labour government would expand free childcare for working parents to 25 hours a week.

And to protect those at the sharpest end of Britain’s low pay economy, Labour will ban the exploitative zero-hours contracts that are putting so many people in the terrible position of having a job that doesn’t pay, but being unable to take up a job offer elsewhere.

So the choice we face on May 7th is clear. A Tory low-wage, low-skill economy making it harder for families to make ends meet. Or Labour’s plan to create an economy that works for working families.

Rachel Reeves is the Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions