Wages in Montgomeryshire are being held down by bad bosses and the tax dodgers. We need real change.

With wages in Wales £201.50 lower than in London, and 50000 workers in Wales on a zero-hours contract, Labour vows to challenge the “tax and wage cheat” culture of multinational companies

Labour Leader Jeremy Corbyn and Shadow Employment Rights Secretary Laura Pidcock will call out the “tax and wage cheat” culture of some multinationals, who “use their power and our weak laws to rip off both the taxpayer and their workers” at an event in Yorkshire tomorrow (Saturday).

Corbyn and Pidcock will make the intervention outside an Amazon depot, as Labour launches its Fair Tax Programme to make the City, big business and tax dodgers pay more of a fair share.

Real terms pay is still lower than before the financial crisis while dividends paid to shareholders have risen 85%. 14.3 million people live in relative poverty in the UK, while the wealth of the richest 1000 people have increased their wealth by £253 billion in the last five years. In Wales, media weekly wages are £535.00, £201.50 less than in London and across Wales 50000 workers are on a zero-hours contract.

The next Labour government deliver real change by taking on the bad bosses and the tax dodgers.

Labour will act against tax dodging by introducing unitary taxation of multinationals to stop tax avoiding profit shifting. This measure is expected to bring in £6.3 billion in 2023-24.

Labour will introduce a package of further measures to deal with tax dodging through a Fair Tax Programme that will return £6.2 billion to the public purse in 2023/24 to help fund Labour’s real change manifesto by:

• Clamping down on the enablers of tax dodging
• Increasing HMRC’s targeted audits
• Establishing an inquiry into the finance sector
• Introducing a 20% Offshore Company Property Levy, on top of existing stamp duties and surcharges
• Scrapping non-dom status
• Requiring greater scrutiny of MPs’ tax affairs

Labour will deliver real change for workers and their families by:

• Ending in-work poverty in our first term
• Introducing a Real Living Wage of at least £10 per hour for all workers aged 16 and over
• Giving workers a stake in the companies they work for – and a share of the profits they help create – by requiring large companies to set up Inclusive Ownership Funds
• Giving every worker full rights from day one on the job
• Banning zero-hour contracts and strengthening the law so that those who work regular hours for more than 12 weeks will have a right to a regular contract, reflecting those hours
• Strengthening trade union rights, including rights to access for recruitment

Kait Duerden, Montgomeryshire Labour candidate said:

“Wages in Wales are being held down by bad bosses and the tax dodgers.

“No Tory or Lib Dem politician is going to confront them and make them pay their way. The Conservatives have received donations from a third of the country’s billionaires, and the Lib Dems have a leader who backed austerity and zero hours contracts.

“We need real change: a £10 real living wage right now, for everyone. An end to zero hours contracts and in-work poverty. That’s what we mean when we say Labour’s got your back.”

Ahead of the visit to Yorkshire, Jeremy Corbyn, Leader of the Labour Party, said:

“The next Labour government will deliver real change because we aren’t afraid to take on the corporate giants and the elite few, who are hoarding wealth and power. 

“Huge multinational companies often act as if the rules we all live by don’t apply to them. They use loopholes to claim they don’t owe tax and cynically push their workers to the limit.

“I don’t want to live in a country of a few billionaires and millions of stressed people, worried about making ends meet every month.

“The next Labour government will challenge head on the tax and wage cheat culture of so many multinational companies, who use their power and our weak laws to rip off both the taxpayer and their workers. That’s real change.”

Announcing Labour’s Fair Tax Programme, Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell, said:

“This will be the most ambitious and detailed plan for tackling tax avoidance and evasion ever enacted in government.

“The Tories have run down the law and resources we have to achieve tax justice.

“Under this Fair Tax Programme a Labour Government will end the scourge of tax avoidance and evasion, and raise essential revenue for our public services.”

Ahead of the visit, Laura Pidcock, Labour’s Shadow Employment Rights Secretary, said:

“Britain’s workers need a government that’s on their side. Bosses are paying too many workers too little to live on.

“Labour will stand up for Britain’s workers and their families with more pay and crucially more power. Workers will not only be better paid but have more rights, both individually and collectively through their unions, and more of a say in the running of companies. Work must pay, and it must allow you to live a good life. 

“For too long, multinational corporations have been able to exploit Britain’s workers while the government did nothing. No more. It’s time for real change.”