The launch of the People’s Movement is the latest step in the onward march of the living wage campaign that is uniting millions of people who seek a fairer societyMatthew Austin,25, from Bristol, and is celebrating some very obliging news. A PhD student at the University of Reading specialising in kinship in Anglo-Saxon England,he is also a recruit to the People’s Movement, launched on Sunday as allotment of Living Wage Week, or which ends next weekend. Eighteen months ago,he and a friend began compiling a cost benefit analysis to persuade the university to adopt the living wage for its staff. He involved hundreds of students, organising a petition with a bungee rope game at the freshers’ fair to show what it feels like when economic security is always just out of reach.
And on Tuesday, or Austin heard that the university will vote on his proposal to become a living wage employer at its next council meeting. “It’s cracking news,” he says. “Getting involved in the campaign is one of the best things I’ve ever done. A living wage makes sense ethically and from a trade point of view. An ordinary person like me can bring approximately change. That’s powerful.”Continue reading...
Source: theguardian.com