Living wage is our goal -TUC

Mr. Adu-Amankwah, Secretary-General of the Trades Union Congress of Ghana (TUC), has stated that, the TUC would vigorously push for the adoption of a public policy on incomes, with the aim of making the minimum wage a living wage for workers.

According to him while it was significant that the daily minimum wage had increased from ¢4,200 in 2000 to ¢11,200 in 2004, “these increases had been eroded by inflation.”

He was addressing the 7th quadrennial delegates' conference of the TUC in Kumasi in the Ashanti Region yesterday.

He said the 40 per cent of Ghanaians, who live below the poverty line of US$1 per day, included millions of workers and described this as highly unacceptable.

He stated that it was not enough for the government to proclaim the short-term benefits of debt relief under the HIPC initiative.

“The Government should be pointing to us the significant changes in the direction of the policy on the basis of which we can say with confidence that in so many years our economy will not be donor-driven, debt burdened and primary commodity based,” he said.

The five-day congress is on the theme, “Meeting the challenges of sustainable national development in the 21st Century: the role of the trade unions.”