LAST week government business secretary Vince Cable held a face to face meeting in London at the request of members of an organisation known as 38 degrees, who wanted answers concerning the latest government tinkering with zero hours contracts.

It proved to be a very uncomfortable meeting for Vince Cable who has previously stated that zero hours contracts suit some people, but he was put on the spot by questions such as:

• If only 3 percent of the British work force is currently on these contracts then why not get rid of them?

• If a person wishes to sign up for a ‘mortgage’ then how is this to be possible whilst on a zero contract?

• How is a person supposed to save for a ‘viable retirement pension’ whilst on one of these contracts?

• Zero hour contracts are nothing other than a ‘corporate global plan’ to manipulate the workers, ultimately to be at the total mercy of whatever employers choose to give them by way of ‘hours’, and thus sufficient income in order to be able keep their family Shamefully the other day I happened to be watching the House of Commons where Labour Party leader Ed Miliband was referring to ‘zero hour contracts’ and said he thought a lot could be done to improve them.

He was immediately taken to task by a Welshman who was quite possibly a member of Plaid Cymru, who demanded to know what had happened to his intentions to do away with these iniquitous contracts if elected at the next General Election.

Finally, zero hour contracts seem to be nothing other than a hark back to the previous decades of the 1950s and 1960s when the casualisation of the workforce and thus a living wage was colloquially referred to as ‘the lump’ and was fought against tooth and nail, eventually to be killed off by the trade unions of the day, never to return so they thought. The ‘lump’ was very prevalent in the docks and the building trade during those days, with those unlucky enough to not get picked for enough hours during a week having families that lived in near starvation conditions.

It is now quite likely, with ever increasing food banks up and down the country, that the two main political parties no longer see such deplorable employment policies such as zero hour contracts being a problem, and indeed will become the norm.

Graham Woodward, Nelson Street, Swindon