So basically Conservatism stands for step on everyone to make myself comfortable, yes?

[the_future_modernes]

lauredhel links and comments on the following assholery: Disabled sweatshops looming in the UK?

A Conservative MP [Philip Davies] has suggested "vulnerable" jobseekers - including disabled people - should be allowed to work for less than the minimum wage.[...]

The MP claimed the most vulnerable, including those with learning disabilities and mental health problems, were disadvantaged in their search for work because they had to compete with candidates without disabilities and could not offer to accept lower pay.

Seriously, what the fuck.

"If those people who consider it is being a hindrance to them, and in my view that's some of the most vulnerable people in society, if they feel that for a short period of time, taking a lower rate of pay to help them get on their first rung of the jobs ladder, if they judge that that is a good thing, I don't see why we should be standing in their way.""

'For a short period of time'. Yes, I'm sure that's EXACTLY how it would work!

This isn't 'conservative' in the sense of keeping things are they are, it's desperately trying to go backwards, in the worst possible way, pushing towards new layers of underclasses in the employment market. And yes, I realise we already have this situation here, and it's a disgrace. And a Labour MP makes that point - at the very end of the article.MORE

Then she links to this article on the subject:


Disabled people and the minimum wage

Would disabled people actually benefit if they were paid less than the minimum wage? Today Conservative MP Philip Davies claimed that allowing employers to pay a lower wage to disabled people would help them to get jobs: “the national minimum wage may be more of a hindrance than a help”, he said.

This isn’t just morally wrong, it’s bad labour market policy as well. After the national minimum wage was introduced without excluding disabled people, employment rates rose for disabled people and the employment gap between disabled and non-disabled people came down.

The context for all this was the Employment Opportunities Bill, yet another attempt by Christopher Chope MP to water down the minimum wage. The Private Member’s Bill was easily seen off – it only attracted 5 votes in favour – but Philip Davies succeeded in snatching the limelight from Mr Chope.

Mr Davies says he decided that disabled people would be better off without the minimum wage after visiting a surgery run by Mind, the mental health charity, where people with mental health problems had “accepted” that they would have difficulty competing for jobs with non-disabled jobseekers.

The suggestion that employers must be bribed with a lower pay bill to recruit disabled people shows a complete lack of understanding of the capacities of disabled people generally and people with mental health problems in particular.

MORE

Comments

[hazel]

Ugggggghhhh I've got nothing. They're talking about introducing youth rates in New Zealand again on the basis that young people are clearly all shitty employees who don't deserve minimum wage (despite the total lack of evidence) and the whole situation is just ghastly and depressing. And this is exactly the same situation, on the other side of the world, by people who have no idea what it's like a) being disabled and/or b) working at the lower end of the labour market.

(Also, like--you are clearly going to have to make sure people have enough money to live on, because letting people starve to death looks bad and loses votes, and if they're not making it through their minimum wage job then you're going to have to subsidise them. I really do not get why right-wingers are so in favour of subsidising employers all the time - I thought they believed that free markets = awesomesocks.)

[the_future_modernes]

I just...what in the hell makes people feel great about making other people scrabble for survival while they grow fat? And youthrate? For real? Greedy greedy GREEDY theives.