Rachel Reeves MP, Chair of the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) Committee, has called on WHSmith to commit to paying all workers a fair wage by signing up to the Living Wage Foundation.
In a letter to the BEIS Committee, following his appearance at an evidence session on the future of the post office network, WHSmith Managing Director Carl Cowling confirmed that WHSmith has not been accredited by the Living Wage Foundation but that they offer pay rates which are competitive with other retailers, in what is a very challenging retail environment. He said that WHSmith start the majority of their store staff on the National Living Wage / National Minimum Wage or at an uplift of roughly 6% in some locations. Alongside this, they offer training and progression to support and encourage employees as they move up through the business, evidenced by several of its executive directors having started on the shop floor.
WHSmith’s 2018 Annual Report shows that the CEO Stephen Clarke received a total remuneration package of £2.9m and the CFO Robert Moorhead £1.8m.
Rachel Reeves MP commented:
“While top executives at WHSmith are being rewarded with handsome packages of pay and perks, some staff are not even deemed worthy of being paid the National Living Wage. Such disparities in remuneration are impossible to justify and WHSmith should pledge to pay all workers fairly and sign up to the National Living Wage Foundation.”
Back to Contents
There are problems the minimum wage can't fix 21 June 2019
“That so many remain positive in the face of desperate circumstances is an enormous tribute to the human spirit. But Hartlepool has challenges that are beyond the LPC to meet and it is important for us all to recognise that labour market interventions on pay have their limits.” These are the words of Simon Sapper, one of the commissioners of the Low Pay Commission (LPC) who visited the North East recently. He said that on almost every single one of the 100-plus measures in the NOMIS Labour Market Report, the town of Hartlepool lags behind the rest of the region and even further behind the rest of the country.
In March of this year the LPC began its annual regional visits to gather evidence for its recommendations regarding the National Living Wage (NLW) and National Minimum Wage (NMW) rates for those aged under 25.
After his visit to Hartlepool Simon Sapper wrote that it’s important to remember, always, that the remit of the LPC is to recommend increases in minimum pay rates that will not damage employment and that the point of these visits is not to judge or apportion blame, but to understand how the NMW and NLW feature in the planning and practice of work in the local economy.
He said that it isn’t a task you can approach on a soulless basis, and among many statistics about Hartlepool, the ones that stood out for him were:
• Nearly 30% of working age people were “inactive” – and of that percentage, more than 85% did not want a job • Almost 30% of households are workless and more than 1 child in 4 is in such a household.
“What does this mean for the resilience of an economy or a society? Where will we find the reservoirs of hope in Hartlepool?”
Simon highlights a striking statistic: in the early 2000s, around 15,000 people (20% of Hartlepool’s population) were claiming one of the key social security benefits. The Enterprise Centre estimates that since then, they’ve brought in around £55m of employment-related investment, including a £30m EU grant.
Roll forward to 2019, and there are still 15,000 Hartlepudlians claiming a key benefit. This isn’t a sign of failure - the current 15,000 will not be the same people as before. That we know because the life expectancy in the town is so far
The Chartered Institute of Payroll Professionals
Payroll: need to know
cipp.org.uk
Page 392 of 629
Made with FlippingBook - Online magazine maker