Searchable article text
RMT helpline 0800 376 3706 :: january 2013 :: RMTnews
12
Not only have London-based
transnational financial services
wrecked the UK economy but
the jobs market as well by
pushing for cheap labour entryi.
Supplying and using cheap
labour is very profitable, and
labour entry is also being traded
for investment opportunities
overseas via European Union
international trade deals.
Successive UK governments
have accommodated and
implemented thisii and minor
political parties have colludediii
with them.
For UK resident workers it
has meant downward pressure
on wages and working
conditions and unemployment.
The structures facilitating this
process, both EU internal free
movement and EU international
trade commitments which
include cross-border movement
of workersiv, have no reverse
gear.
Effectively unlimited
globalised labour supply is
tipping the capital/worker
balance of power in favour of
business, destroying workers’
power to fight back.
Workers in many sectors are
negatively affected by EU ‘free
movement of labour’ and free
movement of services allows EU
firms with UK contracts to bring
their own workers from within,
or even outside of, the EU.
RMT’s maritime members are
being dumped as Condor Ferries
replace UK ratings with a non-
EU Ukrainian workforce.
Without protection, this sector
has been particularly vulnerable.
The UK Points Based System
(PBS), for bringing in workers
from outside of the EU, is a
similar deal with different
labels. Despite the Coalition’s
supposed ‘cap’, key PBS
categories, transnational firms’
‘Intracorporate Transferees’
(ICTs) and foreign students
(actually a major labour entry
pathway without exit
monitoring) lack numerical
limits.
Without protection, the
future for UK resident workers is
bleak.
The EU is expanding to
include progressively cheaper
labour countries. Croatia (18 per
cent unemployment) is now an
accession candidate and trade
agreements with states to the
STOPPING SOCIAL
DUMPING
Researcher Linda Kaucher explains how a
Resident Labour Market Test (RLMT) would
halt the explosion of social dumping that is
eroding job opportunities for RMT members