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IFS says poorest hit hardest by budget: Labour reaction

By Mark Ferguson / @markfergusonuk Research from the Institute of Fiscal Studies (IFS) released today indicates that the impact of the recent "austerity budget" will fall hardest on the poorest in society, and that the measures contained in the budget were "regressive". Labour figures have lined up this morning to lambast the government over the budget, and comment on the findings of the IFS. UPDATE: Speaking to Sky News, Ed Miliband said that the government has been "exposed" by today's...
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Youth unemployment: Where's the sense of crisis?

By David Talbot When youth unemployment hit one million during the recession of the 1980s it provoked a national crisis. There were riots in 1981 and 1985, all in inner-city areas suffering from high youth unemployment. The Thatcher government struggled to show that it had the solutions, with its much-derided Youth Training Scheme and Youth Opportunity Programme. There may not be riots today, but as youth unemployment in Britain hits record levels - where is the similar sense of crisis?...
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Jobs market recovery set to stall: 8 in the morning, August 9th

By Mark Ferguson / @markfergusonuk * Public sector cuts will see the jobs market stall. * Confusion reigns over the government's policy on free milk for school children. * Gerry Adams says planned discussions with dissident republicans aren't a stunt. * Graduate tax appears to now be the consensus HE funding position in the coalition. * Ken Livingstone is interviewed by the Indie. * Alan Johnson hits back at Ed Miliban over civil liberties. * Lembit Opik has a new...
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Defending the future jobs fund

By Chris Davis During the height of the recession, between February 2008 and June 2009, youth unemployment rose from 700,000 (which is in itself a staggering figure) to 928,000. The response of the then Labour government was to set up the “Future Jobs Fund” - giving money to employers in return for providing employment to someone aged between 18 to 24. The announcement in June that the coalition has shelved the fund requires us to look again at the success...
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Fawcett’s High Court challenge to the Budget is a wake-up call on gender equality

By Kathryn Perera / @kathrynperera The Fawcett Society has launched a landmark legal challenge to the emergency budget on gender equality grounds, seeking Judicial Review in the High Court. Fawcett’s main argument is that under equality laws (specifically the Sex Discrimination Act 1975 as amended), the coalition government should have assessed whether its budget proposals would increase or reduce inequality between women and men. Fawcett made repeated requests for the treasury to provide details of its ‘gender impact assessment’. Despite...
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Britain's Lost Talent: Join the campaign

By Yvette Cooper MP Nothing better captures the Tory-Lib Dem government's return to Thatcherism than the shocking cuts they are making in jobs and support for the young unemployed. Just as thousands more young people hit the jobs market this summer, the government is cutting back the help for them to get work. 90,000 jobs through the Future Jobs Fund are being axed. And Labour's guarantee of work or training for every 18-24 year old on the dole for 6...
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This mess of an intern system

By Lisa Nandy MP This week I had an intern start in my office. Like many of the young people who write to me and ask for an interning opportunity she has just graduated and is really excellent, but is finding it hard to get a job without any experience. Helping young people like this spend a few weeks in an office environment, exploring their interests, with a reference at the end is surely one of the things an MP...
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The coalition's economic strategy will reduce growth and cut jobs and support for the unemployed

By Nicola Smith The government has recently announced the sharpest cuts in public spending since the second world war – cuts that the Office for Budget Responsibility has recognised will reduce growth in future years, and lead to higher claimant unemployment. But even these revised forecasts remain optimistic. Given the current state of the global economy, and given the experience of past recessions, it seems inconceivable that the OBR can meet its employment forecasts – and that net job losses...
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Back to the 1950s - The "Fieldian" universe

By Mark Ferguson / @markfergusonuk Frank Field, who is (just barely) still able to call himself a Labour MP, has – for a change – talked a hateful load of old twaddle about welfare and benefits. As the Guardian reported this morning, Field said : "For a large section of what used to be the core of the Labour vote – working class women – what they say they most want is a husband or partner in work which allows...
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The mood in the Commons is grim

By Lisa Nandy MP There is very little talk of anything but the budget in the Commons this week. The mood is grim, although many of the announcements were expected, had been made already, or are yet to come. Wigan, which suffered disproportionately under the last Tory government, looks set to be hit again. The coalition have called a moratorium on spending by the Regional Development Agency – one of the economic engines of our economy – and last week...
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The grim reality of "savage cuts"

By Sebastian Michnowicz It was obvious in the lead up to the general election that any new government that included the Conservatives would mean savage cuts. Indeed, within a few days of the coalition government taking office, the happy couple had exhausted all of the available superlatives to describe the situation – well the economic one, anyway. Despite all the talk of 'new politics', the first few weeks of the brave new world have seen pretty much all of the...
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Don't blame unemployed people

By Richard Exell The Sun reports on yesterday’s employment stats with a feature today, headlined “11 million Brits Not Working.” As they note, if you add the 8.19 million ‘economically inactive’ people to the 2.47 million unemployed you find that “10.66 million – or 28% of the working age population – are not in a job.” Who is to blame for this? The Sun can’t quite make up its mind. The article itself blames “the staggering failure of the Labour...
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All five candidates on how they'd win the living wage

By Alex Smith / @alexsmith1982 Every week, Unions Together are questioning all five Labour leadership candidates on specific issues that matter to their members. Last week, the Milibands, Diane Abbott, Ed Balls and Andy Burnham all answered questions on how they saw the role of the unions in the 21st century. This week, there's a question on how each candidate, were they elected, would implement a living wage. All five candidates back campaigns for a living wage. Diane Abbott says:...
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Labour must offer full employment, small business support and choice

By Jason McCrossan I felt a bit let down when I heard John McDonnell’s words about Margaret Thatcher – that he would like to go back to the 1980s and assassinate her. Not because I hold Lady Thatcher in high esteem – I don’t. It was the fact that his comment was nasty, unnecessary and also that he felt, even as a potential Labour leader, that would be an acceptable thing to say in the first place. I’m sad because...
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Fair pay, please

By Vincenzo Rampulla / @VMRampulla I want a pay rise. It’s easy to admit that reading yesterday’s Guardian and realising that there are 170 senior civil servants who earn more than £150,000 left me feeling more than a little jealous (especially when you consider that the national average wage is a paltry £21,320). To put this in context, these civil servants earn more than the Prime Minister’s wage, with the most expensive being the Chief Executive of the Office of...
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News just in: the future is cancelled

By Tim Cheetham / @CllrTim Among the first victims of the untimely axe of Osbornomics has been the Future Jobs Fund. We have a particular interest in this in Barnsley as it was born here, as part of the impact of the 'Houghton' review into worklessness chaired by our leader. It is - or as I should get used to saying it 'was' - a scheme to create employment to get the long term unemployed and the young unemployed into...
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300,000 public sector jobs hang in the balance

By Jennifer Painter / @jenpainter Research conducted by The Times predicts at least 300,000 Whitehall and other public sector jobs will be lost under the Government’s imminent spending cuts. It has been estimated that this figure could rise to 700,000 affecting ‘tens of thousands of health service managers as well as many thousands of doctors and nurses.’ The article, written by The Times Political Editor states: Three out of the 10 strategic health authorities have disclosed that they will reduce...
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Cruddas talks to Prospect about housing, immigration, jobs

By Alex Smith / @alexsmith1982 In reconnecting with Labour's lost millions of voters - written about today by Liam Byrne and by John Denham - the Labour Party leadership discussion will need focus in part on the sense of disconnection from the traditional core vote, as well as looking at how the party will consolidate its strength in many inner city areas around the country. A new coalition will need to be built - something Anthony Painter has written about extensively....
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Mandelson: The case for a Labour government is the strongest for thirty years

By Alex Smith / @alexsmith1982 Peter Mandelson is about to give a speech to Progress and the Foreign Press Association this morning in which he is due to lay out the case for a new term of Labour government. He will say that rather than being tired or out of ideas, Labour is showing with its focus on the jobs of the future that it remains Britain's only progressive party. And he will slam the Tories' approach, saying: "For them...
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