Zero hours contracts are the reincarnation of evil, says Archbishop
THE gig economy and zero hours contracts are the “reincarnation of an ancient evil”, the Archbishop of Canterbury said yesterday.
Justin Welby was taking aim at companies in “new industries” that he said failed to pay a “real living wage”, forcing taxpayers to effectively supplement earnings with benefits. He said that large businesses effectively “leeched” off the taxpayer, as he accused them of failing to pay a fair share of tax.
The Archbishop sparked political controversy as he turned on the Government to criticise welfare reforms. But after saying Universal Credit had “left too many people worse off ” and called for it to be halted, Tory MPS said he should “remove his dog collar” if he wanted to make political interventions.
At the launch of the Taylor Review into working practices in July 2017, Theresa May pledged to workers in the gig economy they would be “all properly protected”.
The Government said it would give them day-one rights, with sick and holiday pay enforced for vulnerable workers. Despite this, the Archbishop attacked the gig economy and zero hours contracts at his address to the TUC in Manchester, adding they were “simply the reincarnation of an ancient evil”.
The Archbishop said the gig economy, based on flexible working and payment-based tasks rather than hours worked, was the “reincarnation of oppression of the vulnerable in employment”. And he attacked “the profit motive” that led to “the weakest being given the most risk and the strongest the most protection”. He said: “In these areas and in employment rights and in many others, we see that where inequality and profound injustice seem entrenched, it leads to instability in our society.”
The Archbishop won applause as he accused corporates of failing to pay fair tax, something he said showed an “absence of commitment to our shared humanity”.
He said: “I was in business… but when vast companies like Amazon and other online traders, the new industries, get away with paying almost nothing in tax, there is something wrong.
“They don’t pay a real living wage, so the taxpayer must support workers with benefits; and having leeched off the taxpayer once, they don’t pay for our defence, for security, for stability, for justice, for health, for equality, for education.”
Last night, there was a growing Tory backlash over the speech. Charles Walker MP said the Archbishop was “increasingly involved in politics” but should “remove his dog collar and promote his views from the same position as any other politician.”
Amazon said it paid all taxes required.
We have become used to religious figures making political statements. Even as politicians have become increasingly reluctant to “do God”, in the words of Alastair Campbell, Anglican prelates in particular have been only too anxious to “do policy”. But Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury, is becoming less an observer of the scene than an activist.
Last week, he lent his name to a pamphlet from a Left-leaning think tank calling for a new moralbased economic dispensation. Yesterday, he addressed the TUC and won a standing ovation for inveighing against the so-called gig economy.
There cannot be many church leaders who would get union bosses to their feet, but the Archbishop was able to do so by the simple expedient of telling them what they wanted to hear. He accused multinational firms of “leeching off the public” and said gig working was “the reincarnation of an ancient evil”. Not only was this almost laughably hyperbolic, it fails to understand the way many people, especially the young, choose to run their lives. Unions do not like flexible working because they cannot recruit the participants as members.
Archbishop Welby might focus more on why it is that church attendance has fallen so markedly. Research published last week showed that only 14 per cent of respondents now describe themselves as “belonging to the Church of England” – half of what it was 15 years ago.
The prelate was aware of the controversy his comments would create and asked whether mixing faith and politics was worth the risk. He added: “I’m often told that archbishops should ‘stick to religious and spiritual matters’ and ‘stay out of politics’.” He should have taken the advice.