Green Party condemns ‘tough on immigration’ rhetoric
Responding to Sir Keir Starmer’s comment “Read my lips – I will bring immigration numbers down” to the Sun on Sunday, Green Party Co-Leader, Adrian Ramsay, said:
“Keir Starmer is falling into the same trap that the Conservatives have.
“Stoking division and adopting the anti-migrant rhetoric of Nigel Farage and Natalie Elphicke instead of welcoming the important role people choosing to work in the UK play.
“People coming to live and work in the UK play an invaluable role in our health and care sectors.
“Those who peddle this divisive rhetoric ignore this and instead feed a false narrative that it’s migration, not a chronic underinvestment in public services, that are stopping you from getting a GP appointment, a hospital bed, or the surgery you need.
“This is just not true”.
He continued,
“Greens in contrast reject this false divisive rhetoric.
“We are offering real hope and real change at this election.
“Only the Greens offer the investment in jobs, infrastructure and public services fit for the future to fix our broken frontline services.
“Voters know that the Greens will never blame people from other countries for the years of underinvestment and economic mismanagement by the Conservative Government.”
UK care agencies accused of exploiting foreign workers caught in debt traps
Guardian Exclusive: Experts raise alarm over ‘national scandal’ that has hallmarks of trafficking and modern slavery
British social care agencies have been accused of exploiting foreign workers, leaving people living on the breadline as they struggle to pay off debts run up while trying to secure jobs that fail to materialise.
Dozens of people working for 11 different care providers have told the Guardian they paid thousands of pounds to agents to secure jobs working in UK care homes or residential care, with most finding limited or no employment when they arrived.
Many are now struggling to pay off huge debts in their home countries and having to work in irregular jobs for below the minimum wage.
Labour and the Conservatives are now under pressure to tackle the issue if they win next month’s election. The Tories recently banned foreign care workers bringing their dependents to the UK with them, a ban Labour said last week it would keep in place in an effort to bring net immigration down.
But experts say the ban has failed to tackle the deeper issue of exploitation of the workers themselves, many of whom are still in the UK and living in poverty, afraid to leave their employers for fear of losing their visa status.
The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) has now written to the leaders of all three major national parties to demand a full government inquiry into treatment of migrant care workers when parliament returns.
Prof Nicola Ranger, the acting general secretary of the RCN, said: “The exploitation of migrant care workers is a national scandal but little has been done to tackle it.
“A chronically understaffed social care sector has supercharged its recruitment of staff from overseas and a lack of regulation and enforcement has allowed some employers to profit from the mistreatment of migrants.”
She added: “An urgent government investigation into exploitation across the social care sector must be a priority for whoever wins the general election. Lives are being ruined daily and this work has to start as soon as possible.”
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Article continues at https://www.theguardian.com/society/article/2024/jun/02/uk-care-agencies-accused-of-exploiting-foreign-workers-caught-in-debt-traps
Anti-poverty charity urges politicians to set out plan to tackle ongoing hardship for low-income households
‘We need our politicians to set out how they will bring an end to this relentless reality of hardship in the general election campaign.’
The Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) has called on all politicians to urgently address the reality of years-long hardship for families on low incomes.
The call was made following research conducted by the anti-poverty charity which found that the bottom 20 percent of low-income households are facing the same levels of hardship as they were last year, despite inflation falling.
The findings of the Savanta survey of 4,092 adults in the UK in low-income households were scaled by the JRF to population level.
From May 2022 to May 2024, the number of households going without essentials, such as showers, heating, and adequate clothing, ranged from 6.9 million to 7.3 million. Around 5 million households continue to go hungry, skip meals and cut back on food.
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On May 24, during his general election campaign launch in Scotland, Keir Starmer said the party will not be able to afford to scrap the two-child benefit cap if Labour wins the next general election.
The policy was introduced by the Tories in 2017, and prevents parents from claiming child tax credit or universal credit for third or subsequent children. It is said to be one of the biggest drivers of rising child poverty – up from 3.6 million children below the poverty line in 2010/11 to 4.2 million in 2021/22.
Starmer said that while he was committed to ending child poverty he would not make promises he couldn’t afford. The announcement caused disquiet among senior Labour politicians. Andy Burnham, the Greater Manchester mayor, said he should promise that “when there is the headroom to do something, this clearly should be at the front of the queue.”
How climate experts have rated parties’ green policies ahead of the election
How do Labour, Conservatives, Greens and Lib Dems compare on their promises for the environment
Groups and campaigners have called on parties to make climate and nature a core issue at the general election as meticulous scrutiny begins on party policies ahead of the general election.
Party manifestos are yet to be published, however environmental experts at Friends of the Earth have scored Labour, the Conservatives, Greens and the Lib Dems on their green commitments so far.
It comes as no surprise that the Conservative Party have come in a dismal last, scoring pretty disastrously on most of the ten policy areas analysed. Campaign group Greenpeace recently slammed the Tory Party for leaving the country, “crumbing, bereft of hope, and its climate record in tatters” after the last 14 years.
Most alarmingly the Tory Party scored the only 0 out of 10 in the category of ‘defending democracy’ based on its recent introduction of draconian legislation clamping down on protest.
Also unsurprisingly the Green Party came in top, with the Lib Dems second and Labour third. Labour’s commitment to creating Great British Energy has been praised by green campaigners. However Friends of the Earth has said the party must go further, as its score lagged behind the Lib Dems and Greens and “falls well short of what’s needed to deliver on the climate and nature emergencies”.
Friends of the Earth stressed that the ratings are a snapshot of the current moment, and policies published in the coming weeks will better reveal how the party’s commitments shape up in real terms.
Overall, the environmental group scored the Conservatives 27/100, Labour 51/100, the Lib Dems 68/100 and the Green Party 82/100.
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Article continues at https://leftfootforward.org/2024/05/how-climate-experts-have-rated-parties-green-policies-ahead-of-the-election/