The average British worker is now earning less per week than 12 years ago when Conservative-led governments took power, after inflation is taken into account, according to new analysis.
Shadow work and pensions secretary Jonathan Ashworth said the milestone revealed the “devastating scale of Tory economic failure”.
Sharp increases in prices of fuel, domestic energy and food have undermined the purchasing power of pay in recent months, as wages have failed to keep pace with inflation.
The Office for National Statistics found a fall in the real value of pay of 0.9 per cent in the months from March to May this year and 2.5 per cent in the period from April to June, both record declines.
Now Labour analysis seen by The Independent has found that the current average weekly earnings of a UK worker, at £567.61, is 45p less than the £568.06 value at today’s prices of average wages in May 2010.
Mr Ashworth said that the failure to increase the real value of wages over more than a decade had left millions of workers exposed to the current cost-of-living crisis.
He said that the pay crisis facing workers now had been “12 years in the making”.
“This analysis reveals the devastating scale of Tory economic failure,” said Mr Ashworth. “After 12 years of the Tories, the average weekly pay packet is now worth less than when Labour was in power. “With heating bills rocketing and real pay falling for so many we are heading into a catastrophic winter.
“Working people need a plan to freeze energy bills and rebuild our economy with good well-paying jobs to raise living standards for working people. Only Labour can deliver this.”
