Welfare Reform on the Web (September 2001): Minimum Wage - UK
30p INCREASE IN MINIMUM WAGE "INSULTS YOUNG"
A. McSmith
Daily Telegraph, June 22nd 2001, p. 4
Unions are concerned about the "growing divide" between the pay of older and younger workers. They accused the government of insulting the young when it announced that the legal minimum wage for workers aged between 18 and 22 would rise by £0.30p per hour to £3.50 in October. On the same day the minimum wage for adult workers will rise by £0.40 per hour to £4.10.
(See also Independent, June 22nd 2001, p. 8)
WHO'S AFRAID OF THE MINIMUM WAGE?
Anon
New Review of the Low Pay Unit, no. 69, 2001, p. 6-8
The success of the National Minimum Wage introduced by the Labour Party in 1998 so changed the parameters of the debate about low pay that all parties went into the 2001 general election supporting the measure. Article goes on to complain that the minimum wage level is set too low to tackle in-work poverty. It has eliminated only the worst cases of exploitation.