Nearly two thirds of the £15.9 billion of welfare and benefit cuts announced in the emergency budget and spending review will hit working families, undermining government claims that they are ‘making work pay', the TUC reveals today (Monday).
More than half of people renting – 49 per cent in private rented housing and 66 per cent in social housing – would face financial difficulties if their income fell, such as through a cut in housing benefit, according to a YouGov poll commissioned by the TUC and the Fabian Society published today (Friday).
The TUC will argue that the Low Pay Commission (LPC) should recommend raising the adult national minimum wage (NMW) next year by 21p to £6.14 an hour when the two organisations meet on Monday (1 November).
Stress, bulling and harassment, back strains, slips, trips and falls, and overwork top the list of workers' safety concerns, according to the TUC's biennial survey of safety reps published today (Thursday).
The 2010 survey finds that stress is by far the most common health and safety problem at work. Nearly two thirds (62 per cent) of reps say that stress is in the top five of problems faced by the workforces they represent.
Responding to figures released today (Wednesday) by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) which reveal that 152 people were killed at work between April 2009 and March 2010, TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber said:
“It is of grave concern that the rate of work related ill-health has increased in the last year. While part of that may be due to the increased pressures associated with the recession, unions will be concerned that too little is being done to enforce health and safety regulations in this area. The further fall in prosecutions over the past year reinforces this.
Commenting on Making Auto-enrolment Work, the government's review of auto-enrolment and other pensions reforms, published today (Wednesday) TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber said:
“This review could have ripped the heart out of the hard-won consensus to implement Lord Turner's Pensions Commission. It is good news that it has not, but there are still some backward steps in its recommendations and the government's response.
Commenting on the latest GDP estimates published today (Tuesday) by the Office for National Statistics, which show that the economy grew by 0.8 per cent in the third quarter of 2010, TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber said:
Commenting on the government's review of corporate governance, announced today (Monday) by the Secretary of State for Business Vince Cable, TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber said:
Commenting on reports today (Monday) that the government is planning to overhaul the state pension and could raise it to £140 a week, TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber said:
Commenting on David Cameron's speech to the CBI today (Monday), TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber said: