By Democrat reporter
Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar has told a trade union conference that the broken, low pay economy the SNP and the Tories have built is at the heart of so many of the challenges our country faces.
He said: ““It is failing workers, fuelling the cost of living crisis, and weakening our public services. It is driving up poverty and causing ill health. That’s why the next Labour government will make work pay.
“Within the first 100 days Labour will introduce a new a New Deal for Working People.”
Members of USDAW, the shop workers’ union, were promised: “We will scrap exploitative zero hour contracts, ban fire and rehire, and tackle the scourge of in-work poverty by introducing a genuine living wage. We will bring the world of work into the 21st century.
“Our plan will not only strengthen workers’ rights but strengthen our economy too. It will not just undo the damage done by this destructive Tory government but go further.
“We will build a country where economic dignity can’t be taken away with the stroke of a Tory minister’s pen because we all have a share in it.”
He added: “Workers in Scotland and right across the UK will benefit, and instead of allowing a race to the bottom, we will deliver a race to the top. Because making work pay is the way to improve lives.
“It will lift people out of poverty, it will put more money into our economy, and it will increase tax revenues for the public purse, funding schools and hospitals. For too long the SNP and the Tories have told workers that this is as good as it gets. The Tories have attacked and undermined workers and Trade Unions at every opportunity.
“Meanwhile the SNP have peddled the same old divisive solution and told people to be grateful for the odd sticking plaster. They have both treated politics like a game – but it isn’t. There is now only one party of change.
“Labour is the only party that can transform lives, will stand up for working people, and will make every corner of our country flourish.
“Labour is ready to deliver the brighter future we need and our plan to make work pay is at the heart of that.”