Category Archives: Pay

Real living wage to rise by almost 7% in boost for low-paid UK workers

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Hourly rate to increase in April by 95p to £14.80 in London and by 85p to £13.45 for the rest of the country

Almost half a million workers are to receive a pay boost after it was announced that the real living wage paid voluntarily by 16,000 UK companies will rise to £13.45 an hour in April.

Distinct from the national living wage, which is a statutory minimum, the real living wage is calculated each year based on the cost of essentials, and is paid by more than half of the companies in the FTSE 100.

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UK gender pay gap underestimated for two decades, report says

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Findings suggest since 2004 ONS failed to properly account for fact it received more data from larger employers

The UK’s gender pay gap has been underestimated for more than 20 years, according to research that could raise fresh questions about the quality of data used to inform key pay decisions across the UK.

The findings, released in the British Journal of Industrial Relations on Monday, suggest that, since 2004, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) had failed to properly account for the fact that it received more data from larger employers, when it reported its annual survey of hours and earnings (Ashe).

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Water chiefs’ pay rises to average of £1.1m despite ban on bonuses and outrage over pollution

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Total remuneration at companies in England and Wales – many of them under scrutiny for sewage discharge – was £15m in 2024-25

The pay of water company chief executives in England and Wales rose by 5% in the last financial year to an average of £1.1m, despite a ban on bonuses for several companies and widespread outrage over the sector’s poor performance.

Total pay reported by water companies reached £15m in 2024-25, up 5% on £13.8m the previous year, according to Guardian analysis of 14 companies’ annual reports.

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Reeves defends Labour’s £40bn tax rise as businesses prepare for NICs hike

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Chancellor says autumn budget enabled £25bn of extra investment into NHS and shorter waiting lists

Rachel Reeves has defended the £40bn in tax increases in autumn’s budget as businesses brace for their impact, saying NHS waiting lists would now be higher if she had not taken action.

Employers are set for a £25bn increase in national insurance contributions (NICs), which comes into force on 6 April, at the same time as consumers are being hit by a slew of increases in bills for everything from utilities to car tax.

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Major UK investors join push for retail giants to pay workers ‘real living wage’

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Axa and Scottish Widows back ShareAction campaign for chains such as Next to pay at least £12.60 an hour

Major investors including Axa and Scottish Widows are backing shareholder resolutions pressing retailers Next, Marks & Spencer and JD Sports to increase pay for thousands of workers.

More than 100 individuals and eight institutional investors, which manage over £1tn in assets, are backing an effort to encourage companies to pay a “real living wage”, which is designed to ensure workers can cover necessary household costs.

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Bank of England in no hurry on interest rates – but cuts will come

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Despite the decision to hold at 4.5%, businesses and households can take a confident view of the UK’s prospects

Bank of England policymakers might be on a “go-slow” as they look forward to interest rate cuts this year, but the direction of travel is almost certain.

After a meeting on Thursday when interest rates were kept on hold at 4.5%, City investors bet there would be more reductions in the cost of borrowing this year, most likely two cuts reducing the rate to 4%.

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UK drops down list of affluent nations after decade of stagnation, NIESR finds

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Districts in Birmingham now ranked below poorest areas of France, Malta and Slovenia as institute urges rethink on planned welfare cuts

The UK has tumbled down the league of affluent nations after almost a decade of welfare cuts and stagnant incomes, according to a report that found the poorest districts in Britain now rank below the lowest-income areas of Malta and Slovenia.

In a warning for ministers to protect welfare spending before Rachel Reeves’s spring statement later this month, the National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR) said the UK’s reputation for high living standards was under threat.

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Labour unveils sick-pay guarantee for 1.3m lowest-paid workers

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Workers earning under £123 a week to get 80% of salary in sick pay, keeping more people off benefits

More than 1 million of the lowest-paid UK workers are to be guaranteed sick pay worth up to 80% of their weekly salary from the first day of sickness, under changes intended to boost living standards.

The UK has one of the stingiest rates of statutory sick pay in the developed world, according to the Resolution Foundation, with those earning less than £123 a week not entitled to anything. For the rest, the rate is set at just £116.75 a week at present, rising to £118.75 – or £3 an hour – for full-time workers from April, but that only kicks in after three days of sickness.

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UK awarded its lowest ranking for workplace gender equality in a decade

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‘Sluggish’ pace in tackling gender pay gap and worsening employment levels push UK back to 18th in PwC index of OECD countries

Women’s worsening unemployment and participation in the workforce has pulled the UK behind Canada to its lowest ranking for workplace equality among large economies in a decade.

The “sluggish” pace of change on women’s earnings relative to men’s – which means closing the gender pay gap could take more than 30 years at the current pace – has knocked the UK back one place to 18th in the Women in Work Index produced by advisory firm PwC.

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Pay soars at Barclays and HSBC after end of UK banker bonus cap

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One HSBC banker was paid up to £16.6m in 2024 while figure at Barclays was £14.8m after loosening of pay rules

The demise of the UK banker bonus cap has sent pay soaring at Barclays and HSBC where the highest paid bankers have received their biggest payouts since at least 2014.

Analysis of pay documents released this month shows payouts for their most expensive staff surged more than 50% to nearly €20m (£16.6m) last year, after the banks took advantage of looser pay rules and allowed staff to be paid bonuses worth 10 times their salary.

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Hospitality firms ‘to incur £1bn costs from employer NICs on 774,000 more workers’

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Industry body says businesses and jobs at risk unless Rachel Reeves’s tax changes delayed or altered

The hospitality industry will incur an extra £1bn of costs for 774,000 of its workers who will be newly eligible for employer national insurance contributions from April, endangering jobs and businesses, a leading industry body has claimed.

UKHospitality, which represents thousands of restaurants, hotels, pubs, cafes and nightclubs, is calling on the government to delay or alter changes to the tax announced in Rachel Reeves’s October’s budget in order to protect jobs.

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Labour’s employment rights bill: what key changes will it bring?

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Improvements to workers’ rights to include day-one universal sick pay and an end to zero-hours contracts and fire and rehire

Labour’s employment rights bill is the biggest step towards enacting one of its key election offers: to make sweeping changes to rights at work and improve pay. Here are the main details of the legislation, though much of it will take more than two years to consult on and implement.

Guidance – but not legislation – on the right to switch off, preventing employees from being contacted out of hours, except in exceptional circumstances.

Legislation to end pay discrimination, which is expected to come separately in a draft bill that will include measures to make it mandatory for large employers to report their ethnicity and disability pay gap.

A consultation on a move towards a single status of worker – one of the most important changes that has been left out of the bill, which Labour sources have said needs a much longer consultation period.

Reviews into the parental leave and carers’ leave systems.

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Waiter! Soho’s cafe society confused after law changes on tipping

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Staff should now receive every penny paid in tips – including service charges

Whoever said it’s better to give than to receive wasn’t talking about tipping. Waiters around the UK should be starting to receive a £200m-a-year bonanza thanks to a new law that means every penny paid in tips, including service charges, on a restaurant bill will have to go to staff.

Yet exactly how much of the money will end up in servers’ pockets is unclear. The law was changed because some restaurants took service charges as part of their profits or to pay for overheads such as lighting.

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Jobs market and pay growth are cooling off, large UK employers and recruiters warn

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Survey reveals net fall in permanent jobs last month amid lengthening slowdown in employment market

The UK’s largest employers have warned the jobs market is cooling amid a slowdown in wage growth in July and a fall in vacancies, extending an almost two-year downturn in hiring demand for permanent staff.

Figures from the Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC) and the accountancy firm KPMG showed a fall in permanent staff placements in July as large employers made more redundancies and hired fewer new starters.

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Low wages under Tories have pushed 900,000 UK children into poverty, report finds

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TUC says party has overseen ‘huge rise’ in poverty, as Resolution Foundation says average wages just £16 a week higher in real terms than in 2010

The crisis of poverty that has taken root in the UK over the past 14 years has been laid bare in two reports that reveal the devastating effects low wages and price increases on the lives of 900,000 children.

With both main parties proposing tough welfare spending plans, reports have highlighted the link between rising child poverty and slow wage growth under five Conservative governments since 2010 – the slowest growth since the second world war.

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UK real pay grows at fastest rate in two years as unemployment rises

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Figures provide mixed message for Bank of England when it considers interest rate cut next month

The level of real pay for UK workers is rising at its fastest rate in more than two years despite a cooling of the labour market that has led to rising unemployment and falling job vacancies, the latest official figures show.

Fresh data from the Office for National Statistics showed the mild recession in the second half of 2023 has had an impact on demand for workers but has been slower to affect wages.

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Real terms average pay lower in most UK local authorities than in 2008, TUC finds

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Union body says austerity is to blame for longest squeeze on wages since Napoleonic era with most ‘wage black spots’ in London

Pay packets are smaller than they were in 2008 in most local authority areas in the UK, according to analysis by the Trades Union Congress, which described the findings as a “damning indictment” of the Conservatives’ economic record.

The TUC, which includes 48 unions with more than five million members, said stagnating wages meant British workers were in the midst of the longest squeeze on wages since the Napoleonic era.

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Junior doctors in England vote to continue striking until mid-September

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BMA members overwhelmingly back further stoppages and overtime bans in long-running pay dispute

Junior doctors in England have voted to keep on striking until the middle of September in their long-running pay dispute, bringing a fresh wave of disruption to the NHS.

Those belonging to the British Medical Association voted overwhelmingly to stage further stoppages in addition to the 41 days of strikes held since last March.

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UK pay growth slows less than expected as workers bid up wages

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December figures prompt predictions Bank of England may cut interest rates later than previously expected

Pay growth slowed less than expected in December, prompting predictions the Bank of England could start cutting interest rates later than previously expected.

Earnings growth, excluding bonuses, fell only modestly to 6.2% in October to December 2023 from a revised 6.7% in the previous three months, as workers continued to bid up their wages amid skills shortages and a record number of people with long-term sickness.

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UK workers should expect smaller pay rises this year, warns HR body

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Employers are reining in hiring plans despite improved business confidence driven by services sector

Workers in the UK can expect less generous salary settlements this year, as employers rein in hiring plans, according to a report from the professional body for human resources.

In its regular labour market outlook, which gauges employers’ expectations for the year ahead, the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) said employers were pencilling in the most meagre pay rises since the pandemic.

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