In Britain today, five million people earn less than £4 an hour, and if voters put their cross in the wrong place on polling day, there will be little hope for a pay rise for the 335,215 full-time employees and 264,818 part-time workers in the North West who earn below this level.
Rather than putting the economy at risk as this Conservative government would have us believe, a minimum wage would relieve the burden on taxpayers - £2.4 million would be saved on in-work benefits.
And despite what the Tory Party would have us believe, academic research from France and the US has shown that the minimum wage has had no adverse impact on jobs.
On the contrary, it may well have increased the number of jobs available.
BOB ALLONBY, Fielding Lane, Oswaldtwistle.
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