Jenny Jones AM has repeated her call for the living wage to become mandatory in light of new figures which show that more than 9 in 10 big businesses (employing 250+ people) in London are not signed up to the London Living Wage scheme, eight years after the policy was launched by the previous Mayor of London.
During Boris Johnson’s term of office, the number of accredited employers has grown but still presents a small proportion of employers in London, while the number of people earning less than the London Living Wage has increased by 144,000.
Jenny said:
“It’s horrible to think that nine in ten big businesses are holding out and paying poverty wages, while many pay their top executives multi-million pound bonuses. The living wage campaigners have been brilliant at getting some employers to voluntarily sign up. But we can’t leave more than half a million Londoners on grotesquely low wages, so we need the living wage to become mandatory. Everyone should be paid enough to build a life on, the national minimum wage just isn’t enough in London.
“I’m urging the Government to quickly phase this in, starting with the big businesses who can most afford it.”
Notes to editors
1. The 9 in 10 figure is calculated using statistics for numbers of businesses from the Business Population Estimates produced by BIS, and a breakdown of employers by size given by the Mayor in answer to a question by Jenny. Just 110 big employers, 8% of the 1,395, were accredited as of 22nd October 2014 according to the Mayor:
http://questions.london.gov.uk/QuestionSearch/searchclient/questions/question_278217
2. The 144,000 rise is based on analysis of the ONS Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings compiled by Trust for London and the New Policy Institute:
http://www.londonspovertyprofile.org.uk/indicators/topics/low-pay/