Stop Labour's betrayal of young workers

Oisin Duncan

• Abolish age discrimination – Equalise the minimum wage rates – Young workers deserve the same pay as their colleagues
• For the immediate introduction of a £15 an hour minimum wage for all 
• A living wage for all apprentices 
• Organise your workplace and get active in your trade union today!
• Young workers need a voice; we need a new mass workers’ party to fight for socialist change! 

Recent unemployment and wage growth figures show more challenges for young people in Scotland and across Britain. Unemployment is over 5% in 2026 – a 5 year high – and young workers were hit hardest, with 18-24 year olds suffering 14% unemployment. 

In response, Labour Chancellor Rachel Reeves has pointedly refused to answer whether she will stick to Labour’s election promise to equalise national minimum wage rates by the time of the next election. 

The discussion of slowing this down, delaying it until after the next election, demonstrates for the umpteenth time that New Labour Mark 2 put the interests of big business ahead of the needs of the working class. 

Yet young people don’t get a discount on their rent, bills or shopping because of their age, so why should we be paid less for the work we do? 

Of course, the bosses will point to the increasing cost of hiring young workers; it’s 15% more costly for businesses to hire someone over 21 now compared to 2024, but the increase in living costs for 18-20 year olds in the last two years is even higher at over £4,000.

Yet, many of those same bosses are raking in huge profits. We demand the opening of the books of those companies who say they can’t afford pay rises to trade union inspection. 

The bosses’ influence on the Labour government in Westminster is clear.

But we shouldn’t be surprised by this; the Labour Party accepted more than £14 million in donations from big business before the 2024 general election, and now they are holding up their side of the bargain. 

Any remnant of Jeremy Corbyn’s popular program from 2017 has been purged under Starmer, and whether its their support for the Israeli state’s genocide in Gaza or the unfolding scandal around Peter Mandelson’s connection to Jeffrey Epstein, the Labour Party has clearly deserted the working class and young people in Britain. 

So what can we do about it? In Scotland, the SNP are no alternative, having shown their true colours time and again, working often with the Scottish Greens to pass austerity budgets in Holyrood and local councils that punish us for the failures of the system.

The announcement of Your Party drew in hundreds of thousands of people, but the messy first 6 months have dulled that excitement. It’s the trade unions that must take the lead in building a new party for the working class. 

But there is still a building anger at the system, and a hunger for socialist ideas. Without mass organisations to campaign for a socialist program, this energy can dissipate, so we have to build organisations for young people to fight for their interests, arm in arm with the organised working class. 

This means building campaigns around issues that matter to young people like wages, the cost of living and free education, while also getting active in our trade unions to fight for these issues in the workplace.

It also means taking a political approach to these issues, with an understanding that capitalism as a system requires exploitation, and we have to fight for a socialist transformation of society.