View from Newham Dockside

I am not sure if this was art, a protest or an advert but strange display seen from canteen in Newham Council Dockside building last week. Anyone know?

They appear to be dressed as air stewards and London City Airport is directly across the docks.

Just asking...

(For crying out loud do not tell @NewhamLabourWTF)

A Living wage for all Newham Council workers?

At the last meeting earlier this month of the Regeneration and Employment Scrutiny Commission, Councillors considered a "Living Wage" for all Newham Council workers.

We had a presentation by Emmanuel Gotora and Paul Regan from Newham citizens on behalf of the Living Wage commission.

Our Scrutiny meetings are open to the public and recently the Council constitution was changed to allow photographs to be taken during such meetings.

At our first meeting following the election in May we had agreed the work plan for the next year. This included an examination into whether Newham Council should be a Living wage employer, which was a manifesto commitment and Labour Group policy. In order to scope out how we will investigate this our Scrutiny officer had contacted the Living Wage Commission who had recommended we invite Newham Citizens to come in and present to us on this subject.

Paul was a retired Methodist minister and long term Newham resident who is a Board member of the Living wage commission and Emmanuel is a paid senior organiser for Newham Citizens.

The Living Wage is now £9.15 per hour in London and £7.65 per hour in the rest of the country. While the National Minimum Wage is £6.50 per hour.  All directly employed workers for Newham Council are paid at least the living wage but not indirectly employed staff such as care workers or agency cleaners. To be an accredited Living wage employer, there must be a plan in place for all staff, direct and indirectly employed, to be on a living wage.

Low pay is a huge issue in Newham, which according to these statistics "the proportion of residents paid less than the London Living Wage was highest in Newham (37%) followed by Brent (32%). while the borough with the lowest proportion of residents in low paid work was Richmond upon Thames (11%). Nearly 20% of Newham workers are also estimated to be paid less than even the National Minimum wage. 

Paul and Emmanuel explained that the number of living wage employers was now over 1,000. There are also now 19 FT 100 companies who pay a living wage compared to only 4 two years ago. You have up to 4 years to complete the process to be a living wage employer.

11 London councils (out of 33) pay a living wage and in total 30 councils nationally. There are about 600,000 predominantly black and female workers in London who somehow exist on below a living wage. The taxpayer is forced to subsidise these poverty pay employers with housing benefit and tax credits.

Being an accredited  living wage employer only costs a maximum of £400 per year for a local authority (£50 for a small employer) and there is very little ongoing compliance costs since unions and workers are relied upon to "whistle blow" if they are being cheated out of an agreed wage.

Over 80% of businesses report positive economic benefits of a Living wage.There is greater retention of workers, which means spending less money on recruitment and training.  There is also less time reported off for sickness. A living wage also builds individual economic resilience and helps "make work pay".

They suggested that perhaps the Royal Docks ward should be the first Living Wage zone in the Country. Beating the plans of Canary Wharf in Tower Hamlets who are actively thinking of doing this.

When business consultants KPMG introduced a Living wage for their office cleaning contracting staff, they redesigned the contract and improved quality while also reducing costs. Bins were taken away from individual desks and offices were given collective bins. Cleaners were asked to work during the day rather than early morning or late at night. This meant that cleaners felt they were part of the company and were also available for spot cleaning during the day. This saved money and improved quality.

Paul and Emmanuel also talked about their campaign elsewhere in Newham. They have met with London City Airport who won't pay their cleaners a living wage. They say that they would look into it if their partner Newham Council, also became a living wage employer. Newham council has a powerful voice and could be an important exemplifier to other local businesses.

This was a positive and constructive meeting but we cannot forget that due to the savage Government spending cuts in Council grants, Newham is facing unprecedented financial challenges. Further commission investigations into the Newham Living Wage will be held in the New Year.

Ed Miliband Speech on One Nation Social Security at Newham Dockside

Yesterday I was at the Newham Council Dockside building to hear the keynote speech by Labour Leader, Ed Miliband on "One Nation Social Security" (it's not to be called "welfare" anymore).

The backdrop behind Ed is London City airport and (out of photo) the Tate and Lyle sugar factory. Local and London wide residents, Councillors and journalists were present as was our MPs Lyn Brown and Steve Timms, as well as local London Assembly member, John Biggs.

Newham Mayor, Robin Wales, welcomed and introduced Ed as our next Prime Minister, who in turn was very complimentary about all the good things being done by the Flagship Labour Council in Newham.

You can check out the full speech on Labourlist here but I will concentrate on some of the things I found particularly interesting.

Ed reminded us that "Labour", the clue is in the name, is the Party of work and that social security spending went up more under recent Tory government than new Labour because we got people into work.  Labour made work pay by introducing tax credits. Just because there is a small minority who don't want to work - there is a far greater majority who are simply desperate for work.

He spoke about the people who work hard, long, long hours but who live in poverty due to low wages. If a local authority can demand that its contractors can pay a living wage why can't a private company do the same?

For every pound that employers pay above the minimum wage towards a living wage, government would save 50 pence in lower tax credits and benefits and higher revenues.

We can’t afford to pay billions on ever-rising rents, when we should be building homes to bring down the bill. Thirty years ago for every £100 we spent on housing, £80 was invested in bricks and mortar and £20 was spent on housing benefit. Today, for every £100 we spend on housing, just £5 is invested in bricks and mortar and £95 goes on housing benefit.

He also I think appealed to "white van man" by arguing that the self employed and others should get more national insurance benefits depending on how long they have been contributing. Which I think is a very attractive policy politically (which the Tories may well nick - the problem for Labour of announcing policies 2 years before an election)

His key argument is only Labour can tackle the growing cost of social security because only Labour will deal with the underlying causes. Labour will get people into work and off unemployment benefits, increase real wages and shift from housing "benefits to building".  Good stuff Ed.

My question to Ed was that it great to hear his plans on the living wage to tackle employers who pay poverty wages but surely there is a logic that there should be a living pension and sickness benefits as well? Since while it would be marvellous if everyone had a living wage, if people then retire and have no living pension, they will be in poverty again and the taxpayer will have to make up the difference? He gave a cautious response about the need to investigate further around the whole living wage issue.

Overall, even though I had reservations about some issues I was convinced by many of the arguments and felt this was really a clever thoughtful speech of real substance.

Hat tip picture Cllr Ayesha Chowdhury.