Exploitation, not immigration, is the problem

—The European elections – and the performance of the United Kingdom Independence party – returned migration to the top of the political agenda. And not in a good way.

People’s living standards are under great strain. Public services are being stretched to breaking point. The housing bubble and the growth of zero-hours contracts are making people worry about their future and that of their children. But migration is often cited as overtaking these concerns in opinion polls and on the doorstep.

Politicians suggest there are simple solutions to the challenges that increased migration creates. Ukip advocates leaving the European Union and pulling up the drawbridge. Even mainstream politicians suggest we just need to ‘get tough’ and cap numbers, although the public believe them less and less.

Politicians are less keen to address the more difficult issues of wages, housing and service cuts that underpin popular anxiety about newcomers. The government talks about deregulation and shrinking the state. Meanwhile, some opposition politicians still defend the neoliberal migration policy of the last government with abstract talk about the economic benefits of migration that fails to recognise that those undoubted benefits were not fairly shared.

Neither approach cuts much ice with a sceptical public, nor is likely to work. For years unions have supported the principle of free movement. But, just as we believe that the free movement of capital requires regulation, so does the free movement of labour.

For many years employers have been allowed to import workforces, often on insecure contracts, without having to meet existing wage levels. And public services have had to adapt to rapid shifts in population within existing budgets.

The effect of such labour market flexibility was initially to hold down wage growth and keep the price of services like caring, cleaning and catering low. At first that had only a limited effect on working people’s standards of living because the economy was booming, jobs were plentiful and public services expanding.

But when the economy hit the rocks of the financial crisis, falling real wages and public expenditure cuts began to bite. Settled workers were forced to compete with migrants at the bottom of the pay and conditions ladder.

Blaming migrants for these problems is not a solution even in its own terms. Those who do will reap a whirlwind of social unrest and economic dislocation. But just as bad are those who proclaim concern without willing the means to do anything to protect workers – increasing still further the public’s growing loss of faith in politics.

We need to recognise that free market approaches to immigration – like those towards the railways or the NHS – will not meet the needs of the economy or the public. Instead, we need to manage it so that it works both for existing communities and new migrants themselves.

More is also needed to meet the challenge of shortages in housing, schools and health, but not by restricting access to the very services that make people part of the community, which could endanger the health and education of us all.

Labour’s proposals for a mass national housebuilding programme to provide more affordable homes is welcome, but the best way to bring down rents and house prices is to ensure a good slice of that programme is council homes. And public services like health and education – often now unimaginable without migrant nurses, care workers and classroom assistants – need to be funded to adapt swiftly to population changes.

But it also means rebalancing power in the labour market – less freedom for those employers who use migrants to undercut pay and more fairness for all workers, regardless of the passport they hold. Labour’s pledge to limit zero-hours contracts, close loopholes in the rules on agency work and strengthen the minimum wage are good first steps.

The Trades Union Congress has argued for a return to ‘the rate for the job’ by promoting collective bargaining and setting up fair pay councils in those industries that can afford to pay more. Alan Buckle’s independent report on low pay for the Labour party comes closer to that position.

When we tested views with the public the best-received message was: migrants are not the problem, exploitation is. Politicians must find the courage to argue the same.

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Frances O’Grady is general secretary of the Trades Union Congress

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Photo: Toban Black