Wages and Employment

New figures show that wages have risen again, ahead of prices for 19 consecutive months, meaning families have greater financial security and can plan for their future with confidence. But the Conservatives won’t stop there. We will do our utmost to get Brexit done on 31st October, so we can move the country forwards and focus on the people’s priorities – investing in our NHS, tackling violent crime, and reducing the cost of living – including through increasing the National Living Wage to £10.50 per hour. Labour won’t allow the country to move on from Brexit and their dangerous plans would wreck the economy – meaning higher taxes, more debt and fewer jobs.

Key Statistics:

Wages: Average weekly earnings for employees increased by 3.8 per cent compared with a year earlier – growing by 2.0 per cent after adjusting for inflation – meaning people have more money in their pockets.   Employment: 32.69 million (up 282,000 over the last year and up by 3.65 million since 2010).   Employment rate: 75.9 per cent (up 0.3 points over the past year and up 5.7 points since 2010).   Unemployment: 1.31 million (down 49,000 over the past year and down by 1.20 million since 2010).   Unemployment rate: 3.9 per cent (down 0.2 points over the past year and down 4.1 points since 2010) –more than halving since 2010 (8.0 per cent).   Youth unemployment: There are 445,000 fewer young people out of work since 2010 – almost halving since 2010.

The Conservative government is helping families with the cost of living so they have more money in their pockets and can provide for themselves and their families:

Raising wages to put more money in peoples’ pockets – increasing the National Living Wage to £10.50. The NLW is set to be £10.50 in 2024, benefiting over 4 million people with a full-time worker on the NLW seeing an increase in their annual pay of over £4,000 (Conservatives, 30 September 2019, link).   Keeping taxes low, having already cut taxes for 32 million working people so they can keep more of what they earn. To help people with the cost of living we have cut income tax by increasing the personal allowance to £12,500. A typical basic rate taxpayer now pays £1,205 less tax than in 2010 and we’ve increased the number of people taken out of income tax since 2015-16 to 1.74 million (HM Treasury, Autumn Budget 2018, 29 October 2018, link).   Doubling free child care to help parents with the cost of living. We are spending a record £6 billion on childcare support and are investing more than any other government in childcare, including £3.5 billion on early education entitlements this year alone (Parliament, WQ226095, 4 March 2019, link).

Labour would wreck our economy and leave people with less money in their pockets:

Labour have proposed a punitive new tax every two months since Corbyn took office – clobbering hardworking people with endless tax hikes that would leave them with less money in their pockets. These tax hikes include forcing more families into paying punishing death duties, raising taxes for 12.4 million workers by an average of £2,500, putting up the cost of a holiday and introducing a garden tax (The Daily Express, 13 September 2019, link).   Labour’s benefits splurge would cost taxpayers a staggering £520 billion a year – almost four times the amount we spend on healthcare. Labour’s benefits bombshell include a universal basic income – a free for all handout to everyone from Premier League Footballers to even prisoners (Daily Express, 23 September 2019, link).   Labour’s plans to renationalise vast swathes of our economy would cost £200 billion – hammering investment and pension pots and leaving people with nowhere to turn when things go wrong. According to the Confederation of British Industry, their plans to renationalise water and energy utilities, train companies and the Royal Mail would cost at least £196 billion. The huge sum is equivalent to the total amount of income tax paid by UK citizens in a single year, and is almost as much as the government’s annual budget for health, social care and education combined (City AM, 14 October 2019, link).