Elaine Loughlin: Proposed increases for low-paid workers amount to wages of spin
Elaine Proposing, Which An Wage, Loughlin: Now Increase Is Living What The Current It Tinkering With A Not Rates To The Government Is Just Current Four Is Years, The Wage Is Minimum Over Essentially Providing
The Government's move to increase wages for the lowest-paid workers is to be welcomed and commended, but it is simply inaccurate to claim it equates to giving people a living wage.
Last week, Leo Varadkar delivered a masterclass in marketing and spin with his announcement on the living wage.
Announcing measures to increase the hourly rate of pay on a phased basis, the Employment Minister said: “Better terms and conditions for employees must be one of the legacies of the pandemic."
From next year, it is proposed that the living wage will be calculated as 60% of median wages in any given year.
Political reporters who had gathered in the courtyard of Dublin Castle ahead of the announcement were trying to pull the last remnants of Leaving Cert maths from somewhere in the back of their minds to convert percentages into hard cash.
Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe was quickly ambushed when he strolled over after Cabinet to greet the waiting journalists. A smiling Mr Donohoe gave little away but did stress it was important to differentiate between median and average, before swiftly making a dart for his ministerial car.
Mr Varadkar clarified that the changes would bring hourly rates up to €12.17 from next year. This would increase each year to bring the rate to €13.70 in 2026.
The Government might now be claiming it is moving to adopt the living wage, but the figures simply don't add up.
The living wage has become something of a buzzword and an issue that both the opposition and members of the Government have been strongly promoting for some time now.
With inflation spiralling, it is widely accepted that the minimum wage of €10.50 per hour is no longer adequate, so much so that by 2026 the current Government wants the outdated term abolished completely.
Tinkering with the current rates over four years, which is essentially what the Government is now proposing, is not providing a living wage, it is just an increase to the current minimum wage. But of course, that doesn't sound quite as ambitious.
The European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions (Eurofound) states that "a living wage is the amount of income needed to provide an employee with a basic but socially acceptable standard of living".
The Living Wage Technical Group, which has been making annual calculations since 2014, summarises it as a rate arrived at that allows employees to afford the essentials of life such as food, clothing, heating, housing and transport.
Essentially it caters for a person's needs, but not their wants. There are no designer handbags on the living wage.
Last year, the technical group, which includes Social Justice Ireland, St Vincent de Paul, the Nevin Economic Research Institute and Siptu, set the living wage at €12.90 per hour. This figure was calculated using evidence-based methods and was set long before a 7% rate of inflation was even being considered.
So, how then has the Government landed on a rate which is significantly less than what has been considered the amount people need to make ends meet?
Asked about this, Mr Varadkar said the figure had been arrived based on work carried out by the Low Pay Commission, a group that was made up of unions, independent experts and crucially, employers' representatives.
Mr Varadkar added there was need for a “sensible and balanced” pay increase “so that people can help cover the increase in the cost of living, but not to the extent that it ends up forcing employers to close their businesses, cut people's hours or lay them off because that would be counterproductive, of course.”
Consulting employers on how they might roll out the living wage is one thing, seeking their advice on what that rate should be is another.
As Robert Thornton of the Vincentian Partnership for Social Justice said: "There's validity in consulting with employers about what they see as the potential impacts or concerns, but that I don't think that necessarily means they should have a voice in setting of the actual rate or the benchmark.
"It should be more about seeing if there are certain industries that are going to need more support to reach that benchmark, or particular needs or concerns in certain sectors that need to be considered?"
While any increases in pay are welcome, Mr Thornton added: "To be a true living wage it has to be evidence-based, and that evidence has to be research on the actual cost of living."
As well as involving employers in the process, the Low Pay Commission also applied different parameters than the Living Wage Techical Group has been using since 2014. Instead of benchmarking the rate off a basket of essential goods and services, the commission has set the living wage as proportion of earnings.
In the wake of the announcement last week, members of the opposition were quick to point out that the use of alternative calculation methods has brought down the final figure significantly.
"Under the model proposed by the Tánaiste, workers would be worse off by close to a euro per hour, and they would have to wait four years for it," Sinn Féin's Louise O'Reilly said.
Labour's Marie Sherlock agreed that the phased measure "doesn’t go anywhere near fast enough".
Social Democrats co-leader Róisín Shortall looked to the UK for comparison.
“The Tory government, when it introduced a living wage in 2016, set it at 60% of the median wage. That has now changed. The living wage in the UK will move to 66% of the median wage by 2024 — two years before the lesser living wage comes into force here.
“What does it say about this Government’s commitment to reduce in-work poverty, when the Tories have a more generous approach to the living wage than it does?" she asked.
Increasing the minimum wage and fully adopting the living wage are not one and the same thing, contrary to what Mr Varadkar and the rest of the Government might want us all to believe.
The measures announced last week were a clever repackaging but do not amount to an introduction of a real living wage.
Bunreacht na hÉireann was enacted on July 1, 1937, but has been amended more than 30 times since.
The word 'chairman' currently appears 31 times in the Constitution, when the index is included.
However, there are just two references to 'women'.
The term 'human' appears twice, while 'children' are referred to 11 times in Bunreacht na hÉireann.
The word 'State' appears 153 times and 'Ireland' is referenced 29 times.
June 25: Douglas Hyde was inaugurated as the first president of Ireland in an Irish-language ceremony that lasted only 10 minutes.
"We greet you as the successor of our rightful princes, and in your accession to office we hail the closing of the breach which exited since the undoing of our nation at Kinsale," the reported then taoiseach Éamon de Valera as saying during the ceremony.
Seán T O'Kelly became the second president of Ireland. It was reported that he took office after attending Solemn Votive Mass at the Pro-Cathedral Dublin.
"Later, with a cavalry escort in resplendent blue uniforms through gaily decorated streets lined with people, he drove to Áras an Uachtaráin."
June 25: Éamon de Valera was inaugurated as the third president of Ireland.
"Army trumpeters sounded a fanfare in the hall, a salute of 21 guns was fired from Collins Barracks, and the hoisting of the Presidential Standard beside the Tricolour at Dublin Castle, heralded the entre into office of the new president," the reported, adding the ceremony was "broadcast, filmed and televised".
It was reported that before leaving his "fashionable home" in Rathgar, Erskine Childers, a keen gardener, paid a "nostalgic visit to his flower garden".
"Mr Childers indicated that his suburban home had been sold but that he would be bringing some slips of his favourite rose trees to Áras an Uachtaráin."
With the week having kicked off at Monday's National Economic Dialogue, expect any clashes in the Dáil to focus on the cost of living, public sector pay, and... Navan.
- Tuesday will commence in the Dáil at 2pm with Leaders' Questions, before 45 minutes of expressions of sympathy for Austin Currie. The former Minister of State, TD and SDLP MP died in November.
- The Government will take 110 minutes for statements ahead of this week's European Council meeting, which will focus on Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova's applications to join the EU, before Sinn Féin brings a Private Members' Motion on the provision of an emergency department at Navan Hospital.
- Media, Culture, Gaeltacht and Sports Minister Catherine Martin will take oral questions at 8.35pm.
- In committees, the Oireachtas Education Committee will hear from Minister of State Josepha Madigan, while the Justice Committee will discuss the Ban on Sex For Rent Bill 2022, which came about after exposes in the on the practice.
- Wednesday will see the Independent Group bring a motion regarding respite services to the Dáil, before Leaders' Questions at midday.
- There will be two and a half hours of discussion on insurance reforms, before amendments to four bills are discussed — the Birth Information and Tracing Bill, the Higher Education Authority Bill and the European Arrest Bill ahead of the weekly voting block.
- Transport Minister Eamon Ryan will address the Transport Committee on the Road Traffic and Roads Bill.
- On Thursday, the European Council meeting kicks off in Brussels, but in the Dáil there is due to be questions to the Housing and Foreign Affairs Ministers before Leaders' Questions.
- The Dáil will also debate TD Thomas Pringle's bill which would extend voting rights to 16 year olds. The Seanad, meanwhile, will discuss the Institutional Burials Bill.
- In committees, the one-day pre-legislative scrutiny of the Defective Blocks Redress Scheme will take place, with Mica campaigners set to appear.