Dear Party Leader,
I would like you to read this article taken from the Guardian. I would like you read the whole book, but the article makes the point very effectively, and I know you are busy people.
Having read the article, I would like answers to the following questions.
- Why has economic policy under Conservative, Labour and the Coalition favoured deregulated labour markets?
Employers like deregulated labour markets because they lower the cost of their workforce, but as you can see, what to an employer is a flexible workforce is job insecurity to an employee. The policy of creating a flexible workforce is known to have the human consequences illustrated so eloquently in the article and yet these policies have been pursued for several decades. This is why so many of us criticise your policies as creating poverty and putting the desires of the wealthy above the needs of the poor.
This is why I ask why you favour deregulated labour markets when you know that thousands get caught in the poverty trap as a direct consequence of your policies. - Why is the minimum wage below the living wage?
It has been clear for some years that the system of tax credits to “top up” low incomes is simply another government subsidy to business, giving them permission (encouragement?) to pay poverty wages knowing that the government will make up the difference. I understand the expediency of the policy’s introduction, but have you politicians really handed so much sovereignty over to corporations that you cannot make the minimum wage a living wage? - Why is employment law framed to encourage employers to take two part-timers, neither of whom can earn a full living on 16 hours a week on minimum wage, rather than taking on a full time worker with rights?
This is systematic abuse of people. It keeps people in poverty, it creates insecurity which induces family instability, which leads directly to social problems over which you wring your hands with mock sincerity, knowing your policies are directly responsible. You will no doubt argue that to half half a job is better than to have no job, but if half a job still leaves you on benefits, and keeps you in a permanent state of insecurity, I am not sure if that really is the case. - Why are you all supportive of the Trans Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP)? Platitudes about jobs do not actually answer the question, particularly as the evidence for such trade deals creating jobs is at least thin, at worst contradictory. For example, the US/Central American trade deal, despite claims, actually led to a loss of over 800,000 jobs in the US. Hardly a ringing endorsement.
Also, whilst we, society, are debating a range of constitutional issues following the Scottish referendum, with your other faces, you are giving sovereignty away to unaccountable corporations through the TTIP. In particular, ISDS plans involving private courts run by corporate lawyers to sue national governments for loss of potential earnings because environmental or food safety standards are too high, point to a steady downward pressure on the standards of our civilized society.
Why bring this up here? Because TTIP, especially with ISDS built in, will worsen the lot of the poor by increasing insecurity, by lowering health and safety standards and by driving down wages. The end result of this can only be a growing underclass, widening inequality and the acceleration of the global shift in power away from the Atlantic to the Pacific.
As leaders of our main political parties, I would like to ask you one more question: what are politics, the economy and society for?
I believe that we govern to maintain the health, comfort and happiness of our population. Political and economic policy suggests that society exists to enrich a wealthy elite at the expense of an exploited poor majority, for this is the impact of most policies espoused by your parties.
I look forward to your replies. I am very keen to hear how you judge the moral contradictions that you live with. I am very interested to hear your thoughts when you step back from the detail and take a holistic view.
On behalf of people everywhere.
politicsandgardening 