National Living Wage

It’s a sexy title, huh? Hold on to your hats, pals. This one is about to get political.

This week Child Poverty Action Group announced that low-earning parents working full-time were not earning enough to provide even a basic ‘no-frills’ lifestyle. (BBC article)

A couple with two children were £49 a week short; a single parent is £74 a week short.

Not exactly a living wage then, is it?

Not that this is news to the many people across the country who earn the measly £7.83 an hour – let’s look at my own personal situation.

2017. I’m 7 months pregnant, working a full-time job I enjoy in a contact centre. The pay is good. One day, the operations manager comes into our office, and tells me (and my colleagues) that we are all being made redundant as the office is relocating. This means I will have no job to come back to after my maternity leave ends. I am panicky and stressed – this is literally the last thing I needed, everyone knows how expensive babies are!

Violet arrives, and my maternity trundles along nicely. I’m unemployed, but my Maternity Allowance (MA) helps cover the rent, Daryl and I cut out any luxuries (takeaways, nights out, brand label food) and we just about scrape through. 2018. A new year begins. We are concerned about the shortfall in cash once my MA runs out. By chance I am offered a job in local café, just a few hours a week, but it helps. I start selling some of my more valuable possessions to keep our heads above water. Fast forward to August. Daryl’s pay check plus my own isn’t stretching ‘til the end of the month. The last week of the month is a tetchy time. We don’t buy anything we don’t need, and I’m extremely grateful that Vi is off formula (£7 a tin) as Daryl needs bus fare. I start searching for a second job in the evenings as paying for childcare isn’t even an option. I have some luck, the local pub is hiring and I am offered a job. Downside? The pub is closing for 2 weeks for refurbishment. My friend gives me a helping hand and asks me to sell some of her things, giving me some of the money to help me out.

My situation is not unusual. Lots of other families around the country find themselves in the same situation. We don’t qualify for tax credits as Daryl earns too much and works too many hours. Yet if he quit his job, found something part-time paid £7.83 an hour, our income would be topped up by tax credits, housing benefit and council tax reduction. The system makes no sense. I have to work evenings and weekends, because childcare in my area is £35-50 a day. If I work a full shift at the café, my day’s wage goes on childcare, so there’s no point doing so unless Daryl is home to look after Violet. This also means I don’t get to spend time with my husband – we are ships passing in the night. We’ve lived like that before, but it’s a lot harder with a child, and both of us are feeling the emotional weight from not having the time to connect with each other at the end of the day.

Now let’s go back to when I was a child. I’ve spoken to my mum about this and it seems that nothing has changed. She used to be a manager in a chocolate shop, but after paying out childcare for 2 kids, she was left with £10 at the end of the month. There was literally no point in working, she was better off staying home and spending time with her kids. It was even the same with my grandma – she had 5 kids and the only reason they went to nursery was because my grandma was a teacher, and the nursery was only for children of doctors and teachers!

The thing that really gets me is that Daryl’s wage 30 years ago was enough for a family to live on, as well as save for a house. We’ve been renting together for 7 years, have 0 savings and have no ability to even consider buying a house. Renting is so expensive. Half of Daryl’s wage goes straight on rent. The government says it wants to help people renting – the cynic in me says they don’t really care that much, given that they voted down measures to force landlords to make sure properties were fit for habitation…

The National Living Wage is a joke. It’s the minimum wage rebranded and repackaged, and it makes naff all difference. I’m so angry that nothing seems to have changed since my mum was a child. I’m so angry that my experience is the norm – amongst my friends there are feelings of inadequacy and shame, that they can’t afford childcare, they can’t afford a better home, or nice things for their children. We bond over reduced stickers in the supermarket because it means we could afford meat for once, we bring our friends to a charity shop with a half price sale on kids’ clothes, we share websites with tips on making meals stretch for a week. We send the same £10 for petrol and bus fare back and forth, over and over, just so we can get our partners and friends to work.

This lifestyle isn’t glamorous. It’s hard, it’s choosing to put electric on the meter or pay your bank fees, it’s not eating meals during the day because your baby needs nappies. I’ve already mentioned the amazing village I have behind me but wouldn’t it be great if the wages we earned actually meant we could provide for our own? That we weren’t reliant on credit cards and payday loans which ruin our credit rating, shafting us for the audacity of not having money in the first place?

So how can you help? Listen to poor people. Donate to charity shops and food banks. Turn up with wine and takeaway and let us vent or forget our troubles for a while. Don’t talk about how poor you are when you’ve just spent £400 on a holiday or a new phone.

Be kind. Please be kind.