TRADE UNION DESK: ‘It Don’t Cost Very Much’
Any atheist can tell you that being immune to the consolations of faith is no defence against the temptations of great Black American gospel singers such as Mahalia Jackson, writes John O’Farrell of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions (ICTU).
The power and range of her voice can move anyone of all or no beliefs, but her selection of music was chosen to appeal to a broader audience in a more secular society. One example is ‘It Don’t Cost Very Much’, written by her regular collaborator Thomas A Dorsey:
Live right each day and smile on your way
And it don’t cost very much
Just before Christmas 2025, the workers of England and Wales received the most comprehensive series of improvements in employment rights in a generation. “The Government’s plan to ‘make work pay’ will bring our employment rights legislation into the 21st century, extending the employment protections already given by the best British companies to millions more workers across the country.
“The plan will help more people to stay in work, improve job security, strengthening the foundations of our economy and improving living standards.”
Naturally, the legislation has been opposed at every turn by the UK’s conservative complex of Reform, the Tories, their dark-money think-tanks, and the media triumvirate of Murdoch, Rothermere, and Marshall, as a huge drain on business.
Notably however, the main business groups in Great Britain either acquiesced or supported the updating of legislation, as they “will also benefit from tackling the undercutting that good employers currently face when trying to do the right thing, as well as benefitting from a more productive workforce”.
What you do for yourself
You could do for somebody else
It don’t cost very much
There is a trade-off here involving some cost to business here in exchange for wider social gains which will drive economic growth, the primary obsession of this government, and for good reason. It is difficult to argue with the evidence that “not acting would enable poor working conditions, insecure work, inequalities, and broken industrial relations to persist”, according to a recent economic analysis by the Department for Business and Trade (DBT).
The estimated cost to UK businesses is around £1 billion, which seems large from the context of Northern Ireland but less so in the context of a UK GDP of £2.56 trillion in 2024. It should be noted that some of the political opponents of the Employment Rights Act are quite relaxed about UK GDP being 6-8 per cent smaller than if Brexit had never happened.
The DBT analysis argues that these ‘costs’ to employers are actually transfers to workers in bargaining powers and enforcement to ensure a level playing field for the benefit of good employers against those who undercut them.
“To contextualise the size of this impact, total employment costs in the UK were £1.4 trillion in nominal terms in 2024. This means the estimated increase represents around 0.1 per cent of the UK’s total pay bill, rising to less than 0.4 per cent.”
The other side of the abacus are the gains for wider society (which includes business, and even Brexiters). In the UK: “The number of workers on zero hours contracts has risen significantly over the last decade to over 1 million, and evidence suggests that as few as one in six low paid workers move into and then stay in better paid work.” Lives are being wasted.
No it don’t cost very much just to place a gentle touch
To give a glass of water to a pilgrim in need of such
Bad laws restricting the rights of workers to be represented by unions has created an imbalance of bargaining power. The market has either failed or is working as intended by past legislators. “Without Government intervention the issues of poor quality and poorly paid jobs will persist, creating anxiety for workers and holding our economy back.
“Whilst most employers want to do the right thing by their workers and already do, the low-level of mandated protections for workers means that competitors can undercut them.
“This low level of protection can lead to a race to the bottom, not to the high quality, high productivity jobs that are needed to each achieve the growth the country needs.”
Most of this new Great Britain legislation ought to be in the NI Executive’s ‘Good Jobs’ bill, as well as some improvements made in the last decade in Tory-led Westminster. This deserves the support of every MLA, regardless of identity or, for that matter, faith.
Oh you may not be an angel and you may not go to church
But the good that you do will come on back to you
It don’t cost very much.
*Extracts from Thomas A Dorsey’s ‘It Don’t Cost Very Much’
