Mike Parry DISMANTLES Socialist MP Over Labour's DESTRUCTION Of British Business!

Added: 2026-05-30

[00:00:00]Well, I've just listened to Dawn Butler and I've never heard so much nonsense in all my life. This is just typical Labor narratives all over again. I had to shut my business down. I had all I had was a small little cafe in Kent and I closed it down because I couldn't afford to keep paying the bills or the kids that I employed. I'll put >> in this video. Labour's economic house of cards comes crashing down on live TV.

[00:00:31]Broadcaster Mike Perry systematically dismantles Labour MP Dawn Butler over Rachel Reeves disastrous tax hikes. And if you want to see what happens when Westminster spin collides with reality, watch what happens when a small business owner phones in to nuke Butler's entire argument.

[00:00:48]>> No, no. I I think we're all fooling ourselves, you know. Milbour, former Labour minister, very hard-hitting report, the one that says £25 is spent on benefits for each young person against £1 on trying to find them or create a job. But it all comes down to Rachel Reeves and her policies as chancellor. She's made young people virtually unemployable in this country.

[00:01:12]Talk to anybody who runs a business in hospitality, a pub, a restaurant, a racecourse meeting. They cannot employ young people anymore because the minimum wage.

[00:01:22]>> Because of the minimum wage, because of the increase in national insurance, why would you employ somebody as young as 18 or 19 when you're paying the same taxes on them for a person of 24 or 25? I know from pubs I go to, from restaurants, you talk to anybody who runs a business, I'm sorry, the door is closed, young people, because they are simply too expensive to employ in this country. And Dawn, if you were a former minister in that area, you surely can't disagree that the the the conditions for the employment of teenagers is just not there in this country. I had a job when I was 13 and had one ever since.

[00:02:00]>> Well, yeah, you can't dawn you. That's the thing. You can't go to the local news agent and say, "Can I be a paper boy?" Well, no one reads newspapers anymore cuz they get it all online. But even if they did, if you want to undercut the other paper boys, which you should be able to do, you should be able to say, "I'll do a round for five pounds just to get some experience," you're not allowed to do that.

[00:02:19]>> So, um, yes, there are those entry-level jobs for young people that are not there anymore, a lot of them, but exploiting young people, it was not the answer to the problem, right? having young people cuz you know young people if they're not living at home um you know they're paying rent they deserve to be paid a rate for a job that everybody else is being paid if you like that's my leftwing credentials as a trade union trade union right she you can't let employers use young people to undercut existing staff >> of course you can't but there were rules and regulations around even before Rachel Reef decided to up the ante to the employee >> there were variations in but there safe parks children when I mean you're talking as though we still put people up chimneys you know children up chimneys in this country there were there were there were regulations about how much you had to pay young people and then young people could get a job now the regulations have been pushed so high in tax I don't know if Dawn agrees do you agree that a 17-year-old on the minimum wage should be paid as much as a 22y old on the minimum wage >> I think that it's about fairness right if that 17y old. Yes. I think I think people should they're trying to equalize >> people. So yes, people should be paid a rate for the job.

[00:03:40]>> Yeah, but there's no job. There's no job. That's the thing. So the the 17-year-old is is getting a higher minimum wage. I understand that's the policy. But the unintended consequence is that the employer says, "Well, I might as well take the 25-y old."

[00:03:52]>> Exactly. The 22y old, right, can run the bar because they've been there for 5 years. The 17year-old can't, but you're expected to pay them the same rate to stand behind the bar for 10 hours and serve customers.

[00:04:04]How long will it take the 17y old to develop the skills to run a bar?

[00:04:09]>> Two or three years.

[00:04:11]>> So, so, but you're saying it's only 5-year-old, so that's eight years, right? So, you're saying that that 17 year old, you're But 17 to 25 is 8 years, right? So, you're saying that that 17 year old should be underpaid for eight years. No, what I'm saying is in any industry, if you're in a training capacity and you're learning, then the cost of being given those new skills means you should not be paid as much as the person who's got the skills.

[00:04:37]>> If you're if you're doing an apprenticeship with this which >> we don't have apprenticeships anymore, >> but we do. We have 200,000. This government made the announcement of course. We have 200,000. I don't see them obviously.

[00:04:48]>> Well, yeah, but you won't see.

[00:04:49]>> They can still There are things you can can't see which still exist, Mike, like the wind. I don't see I don't see apprenticeships advertised all over the place. You know, can there be a train?

[00:04:58]>> The issue a lot of people who run apprenticeships say they get a young person in and they're so shocked by having to work, they don't come back the next day. They're so shocked by work.

[00:05:09]>> Well, Paul, >> hi Paul.

[00:05:13]>> Good morning, Jeremy.

[00:05:15]>> Who's done this thing with young people are really being hung out to dry here?

[00:05:20]Well, I've just listened to Dawn Butler and I've never heard so much nonsense in all my life. This is just typical Labor narrative all over again. I had to shut my business down. I had to I All I had was a small little cafe in Kent and I closed it down because I couldn't afford to keep paying the bills or the kids that I employed. I put a job vacancy out just for someone to come in and help on a couple of days a week. I got 74 applicants. Most of them were like 15 16, 17, 18. And I'm sorry, Dawn, you're talking rubbish. You shouldn't be paying a 17 year old the same rate as someone who is 25. It shouldn't happen.

[00:06:01]>> That's the issue. I wonder whether Paul, in defense of Labor, I wonder whether they they saw this coming. It's possible he didn't think about it.

[00:06:08]>> But of course, didn't think about they didn't think about a lot of things. Let >> answer. I'm sorry you had to close your business, Paul. Um, so are you saying that because you couldn't how much were you paying people? And is is it because you had to pay is it because you had to pay them more money than you had to close your business? Was that the same reason?

[00:06:28]>> I had to pay I had to pay one lad who was 17 exactly the same amount of money as somebody who was 62. And I couldn't afford to pay the wages. It wasn't just the wages. It was to clump on the national insurance. It was to clump on the hike of the pensions contributions.

[00:06:43]It was NIC3. It was the fact of the cafe. I had to charge everybody 20% VAT, but I don't claim VAT back because there's no VAT on food.

[00:06:54]>> Out of interest, one of the things I've heard big time, >> Paul, when you pay the 17-year-old the same as the 62y old, my understanding is the other thing that happens is the 62y old asks you for a pay rise. Is that right?

[00:07:07]>> Absolutely, 100%. That's all.

[00:07:09]>> That caller just destroyed the entire Labor Party economic strategy in about 30 seconds. Dawn Butler tries to fall back on generic union talking points.

[00:07:17]But you can't decree high wages from a Westminster office if the policies force actual businesses to shut their doors.

[00:07:24]And it's not just business owners sounding the alarm. It's workingclass families who are watching their kids get entirely locked out of the market.

[00:07:30]Notice what happens when this grandmother calls in.

[00:07:33]>> Rest of us have have let them down.

[00:07:36]Irene is in. Hello, Irene.

[00:07:39]>> Hello.

[00:07:40]>> What do you think of what's going on? Is Is there a crisis here?

[00:07:44]>> Definitely. And it's not just the labor, it's the full government that's letting the children down.

[00:07:50]>> Uh-huh. What should be done, do you think, Irene?

[00:07:53]>> More apprenticeships. They don't need to get a adults wage. More apprenticeships.

[00:07:59]Bring youth training schemes back.

[00:08:01]That's my opinion. My granddaughter's mental health suffers through not get a job. She's traveled 20 odd miles for interviews. She's traveled out of town for interviews. And because she lives in a rural area, they had her with, "Can you travel in Scotland between the age of five and 22, they have free bus passes. Of course, my granddaughter can travel. She has traveled everywhere for interviews."

[00:08:28]>> Yeah. It sounds like she really wants a job, bad. Has she got one yet, Irene, or not?

[00:08:33]>> No, she hasn't. No, she hasn't. She's been for about 11 12 interviews and she left the school in December and they keep oh she goes mild and they say no you can't can you travel yes I can travel okay we'll get back to you she went for an apprenticeship in a dental in the next town and was told somebody would get back to her within a couple of days she never heard a thing nobody's interested >> thanks Irene I spoke to somebody yesterday got a job in computer science which he studied at university 500 applications.

[00:09:07]>> Yeah.

[00:09:07]>> Dawn Butler's performance here perfectly encapsulates the modern Labor Party's massive blind spot. They are trapped in an ideological bubble, drafting policies for a theoretical economy while real world businesses literally bowled up their windows. Mike Perry nailed it.

[00:09:21]When you jack up employer national insurance and flatten the wage structure, you don't end poverty. You just make teenagers legally unemployable. Labour needs to stop selling ambitions and start looking at the very real damage their budget is doing on the ground before this lost generation becomes permanent.