Excluded workforce campaign

Shotts MP Neil Gray has joined forces with almost 200 other parliamentarians to call on the Chancellor to aid the so-called ‘Excluded Workforce’ in Britain.

During the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Excluded UK, Mr Gray suggested an open letter or statement highlighting the near 25 per cent of MPs who have joined the APPG to get action for their constituents.

He said: “Long before the APPG was set up I had been contacted but several constituents who had been missed out because of the Retention Scheme rules.

“These are people who either work freelance, have become recently unemployed but do not qualify for any benefits.

“These people have as much right to assistance as everyone else but, through no fault of their own are being made to feel unworthy.

“It says a lot about how wide-spread this issue is that almost one quarter of all the MPs in Westminster have joined together to highlight the plight of the excluded in the UK.”