Workers' Fight workplace bulletin editorials, 6 March 2007

This government makes no secret of its plan to deprive long-term claimants of their benefits, under the pretext of getting 80% of working-age adults into jobs. Never mind the fact that there aren't decent jobs to find in the first place! But what do Blair, Brown and their lot care, if long-term claimants are forced into casual jobs on starvation wages? Isn't their only concern to cut social budgets, in order to fund more tax rebates and other perks for big business and the wealthy?

This week, a new threat against long-term claimants was announced, in the form of yet another report on "welfare reform". This contains, among other things, a proposal for coercing single parents into work, under threat of losing their benefits, once their children reach the age of 12.

One might think that the author of this report, David Freud, was commissioned because of his expertise in single-parenting on a low income. But as an investment banker, this Mr Freud seems to think that single parents working long hours can always... hire a nanny to take care of their kids or else, send them to a boarding school for a £15-25,000 annual fee!

But in the real world of working people, who do not live off fat salaries and huge bonuses, this is not how things work. For the rest of us, nannies and boarding schools are not an option. In fact, very often there aren't even after-school clubs to take care of our kids when we work late!

Of course, the problem would be posed differently if wages were not so low and single parents could make a living on a part-time job. But this is a privilege that only a small layer of middle-class professionals can afford in this society.

Ultimately, what this government's plan would really mean is more children being left to their own devices in working class areas, while their parents scrape a miserly living. Yet, by a cynical irony, this is the same government which keeps accusing us, parents, of not taking care of our kids well enough!

If this plan is ever allowed to go ahead, it will pave the way for a future which may well involve far more of these child gangs which have already claimed three teenage victims in South London. And this is why it must be stopped!

The latest increase in the cost of necessities - without which none of us can live - applies to water. The rise in water bills is this year is more than twice the current 4.2% rate of inflation - between 6% and 10%. An average bill will increase by 7% to £312.

Did wages rise by this much? Of course not. Indeed, Brown told public sector workers last week that they could only have a rise of 1.9%!

So on top of energy bills which went through the roof last year and council tax bills - which will go up again by another 4.2% - the very stuff of life, water, is to be charged at a greater premium!

It is hard enough to keep up with paying all these increases if you have a permanent full-time job. But what about the 11.4 million people including 2m pensioners who live below the poverty line in today's "booming" Britain?

The truth is, of course, that it is only booming - and at record levels - for the rich shareholders who are making profits hand over fist at everyone else's expense! Didn't the banks just post record profits of £40bn thanks to holding the working class in hock to the tune of over one trillion pounds?

As for the government's "regulators" which are supposed to police these companies and banks, "Ofwat" is a prime example. In fact Ofwat agreed to a 5-year plan for the water companies in 2004, saying it was fine for them to make more profits than other regulated sectors like gas and electricity.

And water companies have been doing just that. Collectively the industry made £3 billion last year! This was after they were supposed to have invested £4.3bn to replace and repair leaking pipes. But they only invested £3.4 billion. And it was not as if they even were doing a good job. Thames had to be forced to do extra work to meet leakage targets and Severn Trent and Southern were fined for failures.

One company, Pennon, is typical. Last year its profits were up by 17% even after it gave customers rebates of £20. Then it still paid £200 million out to its shareholders in dividends...

The water company bosses tell us this has nothing to do with greed. Wessex Water boss, Colin Skellett, defended his company's price rise (9.4%) saying "The sole reason for the price rise is to pay for investment programmes."

Spin us another one!