Earnings (Hansard, 25 October 1988)

§ 7. Mr. Harry Barnes
To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what proportion of the adult work force earn less than £3.30 per hour.

§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Employment (Mr. Patrick Nicholls)
It is estimated from the new earnings survey that about 30 per cent. of the adult work force, including both full-time and part-time employees, earned less than £3.30 per hour in April 1988.

§ Mr. Barnes
Is the Minister aware that more and more people are falling below the Council of Europe decency threshold for wages? Is that not deliberate Government policy, being implemented through the abolition of wages councils, the fair wages resolution and the undermining of the labour market through YTS and ET? Is that not a disgrace, given the so-called economic miracle?

§ Mr. Nicholls
No. The hon. Gentleman referred to the so-called decency threshold, which was merely a recommendation by experts. Not one country within the European Community has adopted that definition. No useful purpose would be served by attempting to help the low-paid by artificially fixing the rate to which minimum pay should be geared.

§ Mr. Ian Bruce
Does my hon. Friend agree that the Government have greatly helped the low-paid by providing additional funds to encorage people to accept low-paid work so that they can get on the step ladder back to full employment? Is that not what we are trying to achieve? Does he accept that sometimes people have to take low-paid jobs to learn a skill and so move up the employment ladder and improve their lot and that of their families?

§ Mr. Nicholls
My hon. Friend is right. The Government have ensured, by various tax and social security measures, that the rate of pay of the lowest paid members of our society is at a better level than it has been for a great many years. He is also right when he says that the effect of the policies advocated by the Opposition would be to strangle at birth the new jobs that have enabled so many of our citizens to get back into the labour market.

§ Mrs. Margaret Ewing
Will the Minister tell the House what proportion of that 30 per cent. are female employees and how that squares with equality of opportunity and pay?

§ Mr. Nicholls
I can tell the hon. Lady that the incidence is higher for women than for men. Clearly, there are a number of reasons for that. One reason is that many women find that their work patterns fit naturally into part-time work and, by the same token, they will not be involved in overtime as well.

§ Mr. Conway
Can my hon. Friend tell the House how many extra people would fall into unemployment, and what a grievous effect that would have on the expanding employment market, if he were to follow the advice and logic of the Opposition?

§ Mr. Nicholls
My hon. Friend is right. I doubt that it could be completely quantified, but it is clear that if we were to reach the stage of fixing a minimum wage the effect would be to ensure that many employers would find it uneconomical to employ people and it would be impossible for people to get back on to the labour market.

§ Ms. Richardson
The Minister has failed entirely to tell the House that the new earnings survey reveals, yet again, that women earn only 62 per cent. of men's average earnings, so for every £1 that a man earns, a women takes home 62p. Is the Minister aware that at the moment there is a lobby of Parliament that is campaigning to ensure that there is no watering down of the concept of equal pay for work of equal value? Will he here and now give the House an undertaking that not only will that legislation not be watered down, but that it will remain more simple, so that more women can take advantage of it and claim what is rightfully theirs?

§ Mr. Nicholls
The hon. Lady is right to draw our attention to the fact that women in the labour market and women who wish to return to the labour market have particular difficulties, which should be catered for. Therefore, it is a pity that the employment training programme, in which the eligibility criteria have taken account of the need to be able to bring women back into the labour market, has been boycotted by the Trades Union Congress and some of her hon. Friends. Her remarks and those of some of her hon. Friends about the need to help women in employment will sound far more genuine when they can pledge their full support to employment training, as they should have done many months ago.