Proposed increase to National Living Wage and decrease to age limit 2 October 2019
Conservative Chancellor, Sajid Javid has pledged to substantially increase the National Living Wage from the current £8.21 to £10.50 per hour.
The proposal has already drawn criticism from The Federation of Small Businesses, who speculate that ‘this increase will leave many small employers struggling and, without help, could make some small firms unviable.’
The Chancellor has given a deadline of five years, until 2024, before the new National Living Wage is to be implemented to give businesses significant time to prepare but has also added a further stipulation that workers over the age of 21 will be eligible for the National Living Wage, rather than the current entitlement age of 25.. Should the proposition come to fruition, the Chancellor estimates that this will be beneficial to approximately four million people.
The National Living Wage is a legal requirement that all employers have to observe and adhere to when making payments to employees who hit or exceed a certain age.
The figure of £10.50 was decided by calculating two thirds of median earnings, based on current predictions. It is important to remember that these figures are only speculative and have not officially been confirmed.
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Labour plan to introduce 32-hour working week whilst abolishing zero-hour contracts 3 October 2019
MP John McDonnell has pledged that the Labour party will implement a much shorter 32-hour average working week, which will have no detrimental impact on salaries, within the ambitious timescale of ten years.
Employee Benefits has reported that, whilst speaking at the 2019 Labour Party Conference, McDonnell declared, “We should work to live, not live to work” whilst outlining the party’s plans for its next term in government. He pointed out that “millions are exhausted from overwork” and promised to eliminate the option for UK employees to opt out of the EU Working Time Directive, which currently means that staff can be coerced into working more than 48 hours per week, should their employer deem it necessary. McDonnell also passed comment on the controversial issue of zero-hour contracts and advised that they would be abolished to ensure that employees have guaranteed working hours and therefore enough income to realistically live on. In addition to this, he asserted that the National Living Wage would be increased to at least £10 an hour, again reiterating this requirement for a reasonable minimum income to survive on.
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Sajid Javid’s pledge to hike national living wage will be in two phases 9 October 2019
As reported in CIPP’s news online, Sajid Javid vowed to increase the national living wage to £10.50 and also promised that this would no longer be restricted to those over the age of 25 but eventually to any employee aged 21 and over.
The Chartered Institute of Payroll Professionals
Payroll: need to know
cipp.org.uk
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