Addressing delegates at in Blackpool’s Winter Gardens, Jane Jones – Usdaw President said: “What a year this has been. When we met here last May, we could see the dark clouds of a cost of living crisis gathering around us. Energy bills rocketed, and inflation reached record highs. Not just impacting on our incomes, but on our job security too.
 
“As the retail sector came under even more pressure, with higher costs and lower customer spending. Yet the Government failed, time and time again, to take the urgent action that was needed; action to properly support low paid workers; to support our struggling high streets, and to get the economy moving again. Instead, they spent their time and energy on in-fighting, lurching from one scandal to the next.
 
“When Boris Johnson finally lost the support of his MPs and was forced to resign, the Tories spent the summer focusing on their internal party politics. In September, an already desperate situation was made even worse, as Liz Truss sent interest rates soaring with the disastrous mini budget. Then we got our third Prime Minister within seven weeks, Rishi Sunak; not elected by the people, but appointed by Tory MPs and still refusing to call a General Election to give voters a say.
 
“It felt like a political soap opera, but while the drama plays out on the TV, on social media and in the newspapers; it is in the lives, the homes and the workplaces of ordinary people that the real pain is felt – ordinary people like Usdaw members.
 
“The young members who tell me they don't believe they will ever be able to buy their own home or raise a family. The older members who are terrified that they will never afford to retire, who can't even relax on their day off work because they dread having to put the heating on at home. The parents who skip meals to feed their kids – because the huge cost of childcare means they can't work the hours they need to get by.
 
“There are so many stories. Stories that you and I hear every day. Some of them are enough to make you want to weep and the statistics tell their own story too. Our member survey in the Autumn found that almost one in five were missing meals every month to pay their bills. 83% felt worse off compared to a year earlier. More than half of members had significantly cut down on their heating to cope with price increases and more than 70% of parents said that their children have missed out on experiences due to financial worries.
 
“It’s absolutely heartbreaking, but we can do more than just despair at the injustice of it all. We can give all of those workers a voice. We can make that voice heard, louder and stronger than ever. We can use that voice to achieve real change for the better – secure employment, equality in the workplace and an end to poverty pay. That's why we are working so hard to build a bigger, stronger union.
 
“The union will be taking our policies forward after the conference, lobbying the Government, and raising issues with employers. This is a crucial time, as we approach a general election. In the coming months, the union will be closely involved in the Labour Party's policy process, we will be putting forward members' priorities for the next Labour Government's manifesto.
 
“Thanks to the fantastic 96.7% YES vote in the political fund ballot, we can continue to campaign on the issues that matter so much to our members. Issues like Freedom from Fear, where we are campaigning for stronger legal protections for our members and for those protections to be properly enforced. This conference is crucial in formulating our policies and guiding those campaigns.”
 
Notes for editors:

Usdaw (Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers) is the UK's fifth biggest trade union with over 350,000 members. Most Usdaw members work in the retail sector, but the union also has many members in transport, distribution, food manufacturing, chemical industry and other trades www.usdaw.org.uk

For Usdaw press releases visit: http://www.usdaw.org.uk/news and you can follow us on Twitter @UsdawUnion