Citizens UK is planning a ‘Day for civil society’ on 2 May with the overall theme of money and fair wages.
The day will involve thousands of people from various religious denominations and civil society groups, several London venues and selected politicians.
The event will begin at 10.30am with a Catholic mass at Southwark Cathedral delivered by the Archbishops of Southwark and Westminster, that will have the theme of ‘paying a living wage’.
At 11am there will be a gospel rally at the Emmanuel Centre in Marsham Street, calling for the introduction of anti-usury legislation capping the cost of credit at 20 per cent, as other European countries have.
“It’s the second time we have called for this,” said Citizens UK chief executive Neil Jameson. “Labour did include it in their election manifesto but now we have to call for it again.”
He said such a cap would make “a massive difference”.
“In other European countries that have such legislation in place, there are no loan sharks, but here the loan shark industry is expanding because there is no regulation around what they can do.”
Ed Davey, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, is the target for this campaign and has been invited to attend.
Simultaneously, at Methodist Central Hall a number of scholars from the Muslim, Jewish and evangelical traditions will gather to discuss the Biblical, Koranic and Torah traditions of how money is controlled.
Then at 2pm 2,500 people from the earlier rallies will convene at Methodist Central Hall to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the Living Wage, a campaign that has “put £70m into the pockets of poor people without any government involvement whatsoever”, said Jameson.
Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith and his shadow Liam Byrne have been invited to attend that part of the day and will be lobbied to include living wage obligations in all government contracts.
“It will be a mixture of politics, religion and civil society,” said Jameson. “If the government won’t protect us by introducing a decent wage level then we have to fight for that ourselves.”
