Wages ‘massively’ failing to keep up with cost of living no thank you for key workers

Energy price shocks households face were utterly predictable and a result of chronic political failure, says GMB Union

GMB Union says today’s growth figures showing wages ‘massively’ failing to keep up with the cost of living are no kind of thank you for the keyworkers who kept the country going through the pandemic.

Gary Smith, GMB General Secretary, said:

“When political leaders clapped for our key workers, it should have been a turning point.

“Two years on the ‘thank you’ for those who care for the sick and vulnerable, collect our bins, support our children in school and help to keep us fed and watered, is wages that massively fail to keep up with the cost of living.

“It’s only going to get worse.

“Most of the energy price shocks households face were utterly predictable and a result of chronic political failure.

“The erosion of our energy infrastructure — not least gas storage and the increased dependency on imports from authoritarian regimes — has run parallel to years of public-spending cuts and a race to the bottom on pay and conditions in swathes of the private sector.

“The UK desperately needs a grown up energy policy that lives in the real world, while workers across public and private sectors need a proper pay rise that means they don’t have to choose between eating or heating.”