New Labour Back bencher threat to agency staff

One wonders if the MP for Ellesmere Port and Neston, New Labour's Andrew Miller, is actually intent on damaging the UK economy, or if it is only a side effect of his attempt to grab more influence for the unions.

Supported (of course) by the trade unions he has tabled a private members bill to force the same rights/benefits as full time employees receive on agency staff, such a sick pay.

The union said there should be a "level playing field" with permanently employed people.

I have often heard full time employees express slightly jealous amazement when they find out what agency staff are paid by comparison.

The fact is that agency staff usually get a higher pay scale than permanent staff. This generally makes up at least the financial difference for sick pay and annual leave, etc. that they don’t get.

They usually also get a premium to make up for the lack of job security, as they generally fill posts where full time employees are off long term sick, having children, or the post is unable to be filled. They are also used when capacity suddenly and temporarily needs to be expanded for a project.

These people tend to be independent and avoid union membership. They also tend to take far less sick leave; so can spend that portion of their wage as they choose.

If they had the same rights and conditions as full time employees they would no longer be competitive, or of any use to an employer, in the capacity they are generally used in. It would not be economical to pay them the same rates as they get now.

If these rights were introduced then this sector would become much less competitive and be markedly reduced. The knock on is that all the businesses that make use of them to fill in would be less efficient and less cost effective.

This would in turn force them to look for redundancies more often and make full time employees positions a little less secure. It would of course strengthen the union’s position.

Is it really a myth that migrant workers do jobs UK workers wont?

According to the Telegraph a new report by Migrationwatch is claiming it is a myth that foreign workers are just doing work which UK workers don’t want, or filling newly-created jobs.

There is a suggestion that a generation of low-skilled British workers risks being ‘trapped’ in unemployment by record immigration.

They express concern that a combination of generous benefits and immigrant labour willing to work for low wages will create "an underclass of discouraged British workers."

A single person under 25, on the minimum wage of £193 pw is just £10 a day better off than if they were on the dole. A married person with two children is £30 pw better off than on the dole.

So what’s all this myth exploding nonsense then? The British worker would appear to be virtually as well off on the dole as doing these jobs. It is not surprising they don’t want to do the jobs. But it is still definitely a matter of them not being willing to do the jobs for the money.

It seems that Frank Field, the former Labour welfare reform minister interprets this as immigrant workers ‘trapping’ British-born people in unemployment, because the higher the level of immigration in an area, the ‘harder’ it is for the unemployed to come off Jobseeker's Allowance.

This is backwards logic at best. The state can hardly blame migrant workers for the fact that it pays such generous dole benefits that, by the time transport costs and the bother of getting up in the morning are taken into account, the recipients are unwilling to do jobs that would probably actually leave them worse off, while the more motivated migrant workers are willing to underbid them for work.

Surely the UK workers would be unwilling to work for these wages, doing these jobs in any case?

Is that not the reason why those jobs are available for the migrant workers to do in the first place - otherwise all these jobs would surely already be filled by British workers?

This situation primarily results from the level the Government sets it’s dole benefits at, combined with our membership of the EC.

EU Conflicted over Low energy light ‘bulbs’

The EU is mandating Low energy light bulbs.

The EU also has an import tariff of up to 60% on Chinese manufactured Low energy light bulbs. Over 80% of these bulbs sold in the EU are not made in the EU. The Commission have just voted to extend that tariff for another 12 months.

Clearly free trade enthusiasts then…

So the EU it is not really keen on all low energy light bulbs then – just those manufactured within the EU.

Environmental group Worldwide Fund for Nature don’t like the tariff and would like to see sales of the bulbs increase despite the serious environmental threat from the mercury in them.

Curious that the EU bans the sale and repair of mercury barometers on the grounds that they contain mercury, not exactly known for their environmental impact - whilst at the same time promotes these bulbs, that if taken up in huge numbers will likely prove to be a dangerous source of mercury pollution when disposed of.