Labour Party Conference arrived in Liverpool this week, with Sir Keir Starmer and his Shadow Cabinet determined to demonstrate that they are a Party ready for Government.

A recurring theme of major speeches in the Conference Hall was the need to bring an end to “an age of insecurity and anxiety”. While this was often articulated in the context of major global upheaval – whether due to the climate emergency, energy crisis or international conflict – there was also a clear recognition that persistently sluggish economic growth and the cost-of-living crisis has meant that insecurity is a real and daily experience for millions of people across the country today.

At the heart of this experience is that work is often low-paid, offers uncertain hours and lacks core rights and protections. Previous Work Foundation analysis has demonstrated that over six million people rely on severely insecure work, which not only leaves them with a heightened risk of job loss, but can also have significantly negative impacts on their health and wellbeing and future career trajectory. And it has been demonstrated that those who face wider challenges in the labour market – such as women, those with disabilities and those from ethnic minority backgrounds – are more likely to experience this in-work insecurity than others.

On the eve of Conference season, the Work Foundation published new research exploring how severely insecure work plays out regionally in England – examining the levels of insecure work across the nine Mayoral Combined Authorities and Greater London. The analysis shines an alarming light on the concentrations of insecure work many of our regional cities and towns are contending with – for example, while one in five jobs is severely insecure across England, that figure becomes one in four in the Tees Valley, and one in three in Middlesbrough.

Figure 1: Map of above, and below average incidence of severely insecure work across Combined Authorities in England and Greater London.

That’s why we focussed our convening efforts at Labour Conference squarely on how Government, Combined Authorities and employers can do more to widen access to secure and well-paid work in the next Parliament. Across our events we heard from senior politicians, prospective candidates, union representatives, employers and a host of third sector organisations – and while it’s clear the challenges are varied and complex, there is an emerging consensus that action on these issues is long overdue, and that it must be a priority for the next Parliament.

In this context, it was encouraging to see that alongside significant commitments to drive long-term investment and economic growth across the UK, tackle energy prices and boost house building, the Labour leader emphasised the importance of strengthening employment regulations and protections via its New Deal for Working People, alongside commitments to devolve new powers and funding to local areas. Across the Conference we heard the most explicit commitments yet from Labour to tackling things like exploitative zero hours contracts and pernicious practices such as ‘fire and re-hire’.

But the reality is that genuinely widening access to secure work for those that need it most will depend just as much on how these kinds of changes are implemented. And crucially, alongside any legislative change, we must also see change in terms of employer practices and workplace culture too. The Work Foundation will soon publish new analysis in both of these areas, including a practical guide on how best to curtail the use of exploitative zero hours contracts as well as new research undertaken with the Chartered Management Institute on how decisions made by leaders and managers within organisations can boost job security too.

In his leaders’ speech, Sir Keir Starmer spoke of his ambition to usher in ‘a decade of national renewal’. If that ambition is to be realised, then ultimately we must see a dramatic reduction in the levels of severely insecure work that we see across the country by 2030. This week Labour signalled their intent to do so – now the focus must be on translating that intent into legislative action and practical change.

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