This year marks the tenth anniversary of Labour passing the National Minimum Wage Act. It remains one of the Labour Party's proudest achievements having benefited thousands of people in Waltham Forest and millions of people across the country. Almost everyone who works in the UK is legally entitled to be paid the National Minimum Wage - that includes people employed permanently, by an agency, part-time workers, casual workers, or people on a short-term contract.

Cllr Clyde Loakes- Leader of the Labour Group in Waltham Forest commented-

"Everyone deserves a proper wage, and we don’t want to go back to the days when people could earn just £1.20 for an hour’s hard work. When David Cameron and local Tory MP Ian Duncan- Smith campaigned against the National Minimum Wage, wages of as little as £1.20 an hour were common and legal. That’s just £1.38 an hour in today’s prices. So when they try to tell you that they care about families and people struggling to make ends meet, just imagine what it would be like to live on £1.38 an hour today, rather than the current £5.52 National Minimum Wage hourly rate, that will be rising to £5.73 on the 1st October. 

David Cameron said the minimum wage "would send unemployment straight back up" but Labour has delivered a rising minimum wage and more people in work than ever before."  

Ten years on Labour is building on this success and strengthening fairness in the workplace by making tips additional to the minimum wage. Regulations will be amended so that tips can no longer count towards payment of the National Minimum Wage. The changes will end the practice by some rogue employers of using gratuities and service charges processed through the payroll to 'top up' staff wages to meet the £5.52 per hour National Minimum Wage - which rises to £5.73 on 1 October- and will also making tipping fairer, by making sure that tips go to the service staff, for whom people leave them for.