The only way out of the giant mess Britain’s economy is in is for Labour to crackdown on skivers

Sicknote UK THE Welfare Party’s creation of a world where work is increasingly optional is crushing hopes of a return to prosperity. Yesterday’s unemployment and benefit figures were dismal. Chancellor John Healey’s ‘I didn’t know’ excuse won’t wash – Labour must stop the benefits jamboree and back Britain’s strivers Credit: Alamy Britain’s sickness benefits bill has ballooned to a record 7.6million claims — including 4.1million on disability PIPs and 3.5million on the health element of Universal Credit. Shockingly, that is up by ONE MILLION in just a year. Sign up for The Sun newsletter Thank you! A FIFTH of all working-age adults have now disappeared from the jobs market altogether. Meanwhile, more than 200,000 jobs have been lost since Labour took power. READ MORE FROM THE SUN SAYS Private sector wages are rising at just 2.9 per cent. But in the public sector — where the Government has spent billions on pay bribes to striking doctors, teachers and train drivers — wage increases are DOUBLE at six per cent. Labour’s addiction to State power means that pay gap will only get wider and the cost to a shrinking number of taxpayers even higher. Does anyone in Government understand the massive economic problems the country now faces? Yesterday, allies of Chancellor John Healey desperately briefed he didn’t know how bad things were until arriving in the Treasury. Really? Most read in The Sun With debt and welfare spiralling out of control and growth near zero, Britain has been facing a slow-motion economic car crash for well over a year. The only way out of the giant mess is for Healey to crack down on the skivers’ benefits jamboree. He then needs to show he is committed to freeing up the strivers by cutting taxes and putting more money back in their pockets. So far, there’s been precious little sign that Labour has the stomach for the fight needed to deliver either. Lou blow SIR Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves’ answer to the crippled public finances was to target business. But driving up National Insurance on employers and making the minimum wage unaffordable only ended up pricing a million young people out of jobs. Yesterday, First Minister Lou Haigh unveiled another genius plan. This time it’s to saddle firms with another costly headache by bringing in new laws which will allow all staff greater flexible working. That includes the right to demand more working from home. Bosses will be compelled to waste time holding meetings over any requests — and come up with reasons for refusing. It won’t do anything to boost growth or productivity, one of the Government’s main aims. In fact, it might well have the opposite effect. But it’s not a bad return for the union chiefs who pushed for ever more onerous workers’ rights in return for donating millions to Labour. 1 comment1