Workers £42 worse off than a decade ago
TUC SAYS PAY PACKETS WILL NOT RECOVER UNTIL 2024
WORKERS in the North East are earning up to £42 a week less in real terms than they did a decade ago, according to a new report.
The analysis, based on Office for National Statistics figures, was carried out by the TUC and published today .
It showed which local authority areas have suffered the biggest hit to real wages – take home pay once the cost of living has been taken into account – since the 2008 financial crisis.
People working in Gateshead have the most ground to make up. They are still earning around 10% less in real terms than a decade ago, the equivalent of £42 a week, the equivalent of £2,184 a year.
The next worst affected area in the region was South Tyneside, down 7% or
£28 a week, then Sunderland where real wages have dropped by 5%, or £22 a week.
TUC Regional Secretary Beth Farhat said: “The Government has failed to tackle Britain’s cost of living crisis. As a result many families across the region will be worse off this Christmas than a decade ago.
“While pay packets have recovered in most leading economies, wage growth in the UK is stuck in the slow lane.
“Ministers need to wake up and get wages rising faster. This means giving all public sector workers the pay rise they have earned and giving unions the right to bargain in more workplaces.
“And it means boosting the minimum wage to £10 an hour as soon as possible.”
The TUC has said UK workers were suffering the longest real wage squeeze in more than 200 years, with average pay packets not set to recover to their 2008 level until 2024.
It added that the country was one of only two advanced economies (along with Italy) where real wages are still lower than a decade ago.
Ironically former Brexit secretary Dominic Raab, the bookies’ favourite to take over from Theresa May before the confidence vote on Wednesday, was mocked on social media because of a tweet he sent based on an ONS graph which he said showed real wages growing faster than they had done in 10 years. It was from the same ONS Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings survey the TUC had used to highlight how far behind real wages lagged behind 2008 levels.
“Good working wrote.
Mr Raab’s theme was taken up in the statement issued by the Government in response to news for Britain”, he the TUC report.
A government spokesman said: “The UK’s jobs market has never been stronger, employment is at a record high with more people in work in every region of the UK since 2010 and wages are now rising at their fastest in a decade. We have cut income tax for 31 million people, and through the national living wage we have helped to deliver the fastest wage growth in 20 years for over two million of the lowest paid workers.” When we contacted the Government for further comment about the graph confirming the analysis by the TUC, it said it had nothing to add, other than it was highlighting the upward trend in real wages. Beth Farhat