Michael D. Higgins on the minimum wage

I'm not on the minimum wage,  but I dread to think what life is like in this country for anyone who is.  Anyone who is honest and hardworking enough to get up out of bed in the morning and toil for a wage that has been deemed the minimum necessary in order to subsist.  After all, it was not called the minimum wage for nothing. 

As readers will know, our scumbag Government has cut the minimum wage by over 11 per cent, while leaving Ireland's scandalously low 12.5% corporate tax rate untouched.  While failed bankers continue to claim bonuses for wrecking the economy, and while those on over €500,000 will see a 4% net increase in their income.  The Labour Party, to its credit, tabled a motion against the cutting of the minimum wage, the text of which you can see below.  There are some very revealing points in it, so it is well worth a read.  

It is also a novelty to hear an Irish politician who is able to string a few coherent words together on any subject, let alone one as important as this.   Michael D. Higgins does so eloquently in the YouTube clip above (thanks Ponyboy). 

 Let's hope when Fine Gael / Labour form the next government, they remember their pledges to reverse this attack on the most decent, most hardworking, most pissed-upon section of our workforce.

Labour Party motion against the lowering of the minimum wage
“That Dáil Éireann:

recognising that the national minimum wage is low, providing a full-time employee with less than €18,000 annually (with reductions for those under 18 or in their first job), and that amongst EU states it ranks as 12th highest when measured as a percentage of average monthly wages and 9th highest if measured in terms of purchasing power parity

accepting that:

the current minimum wage has not kept pace with average growth in wages or been increased since July 2007;

the 2009 income levy has already reduced the real value of the minimum wage; and

the new universal social charge will be payable on wages at this level;

concerned that 116,000 workers, or 6.6% of the workforce, are living below the poverty line, that the working poor make up 24% of all those in poverty and 40% of all households in poverty, and that the minimum wage is especially relied upon for protection by women, migrants and other vulnerable workers;

noting that only 4% of workers, and only 1.2% of industrial workers in export sectors, are on the minimum wage, with no major impact on competitiveness;

acknowledging the role of a statutory minimum wage in protecting against unfair competitive advantage by unscrupulous employers who exploit their workers;

further acknowledging the opportunity available through the Labour Court, which has yet to be invoked by any employer, to plead inability to pay the national minimum wage;

reaffirming that a statutory minimum wage is a statement of core values, providing a threshold of decency under which society agrees that workers’ wages should not fall, and that a reduction would signal a race to the bottom in which everyone – low wage workers, public and private sector workers, social welfare claimants and pensioners – will suffer;

believing that a reduction in the minimum wage will only create a disincentive to work, will have no impact on the public debt or on economic recovery and makes absolutely no sense at any level;

condemning the Government's logic that poverty wages will create more jobs and that welfare rates must be below even those poverty wages, which logic will in turn require major cuts in welfare payments; and

appalled that the Government’s four year plan has targeted the most vulnerable members of society and convinced that the proposed reduction in the minimum wage of one euro an hour will have the most profound impact on those who are poorest, deepen their poverty and draw more workers into poverty;

condemns the Government’s unnecessary, unwise and unfair decision to reduce the national minimum wage and calls for a reversal of this cut.”

— Willie Penrose, Eamon Gilmore, Joan Burton, Emmet Stagg, Thomas P. Broughan, Joe Costello, Michael D. Higgins, Brendan Howlin, Ciarán Lynch, Kathleen Lynch, Liz McManus, Brian O'Shea, Jan O'Sullivan, Ruairí Quinn, Pat Rabbitte, Seán Sherlock, Róisín Shortall, Joanna Tuffy, Mary Upton, Jack Wall.




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