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Minimum wage should rise to £15 for all workers ‘as soon as possible’, TUC says
While the government says it is ‘determined to make work pay’, it has criticised the proposed wage increase…
The Trades Union Congress (TUC) has called for the national minimum wage to increase to £15 an hour to help millions of workers with the cost of living crisis.
Currently, the minimum wage is £9.50 an hour for workers over the age of twenty-three, and £9.18 for those aged twenty-one and twenty-two-years-old.
However, with inflation at 10.1% and poised to rise even higher, wages are not going as far.
This is why the TUC has launched a campaign to increase the national minimum wage to a set rate of £15 an hour for workers of all ages.
Announcing its campaign, the TUC said too many workers were living ‘wage packet to wage packet’, and that a £15 minimum should be in place by at least 2030.
They said this could be achieved sooner with a government that was serious about getting wages rising after years of declining pay.
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In a report setting out its plan, the TUC called on the government to work with the Low Pay Commission to reach the level ‘as soon as possible over time’.
Frances O’Grady, general secretary of the TUC, said: “Every worker should be able to afford a decent standard of living.
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“But millions of low-paid workers live wage packet to wage packet, struggling to get by – and they are now being pushed to the brink by eye-watering bills and soaring prices.”
However, while the government has said it was ‘determined to make work pay’, it said setting the minimum wage too high or increasing it too quickly could lead to higher unemployment.
Business leaders have seconded this concern, with Matthew Percival, the CBI’s director of skills and inclusion, saying: “Business supports a higher wage economy, but the only sustainable path – not only for those earning the minimum wage, but right across the economy – is higher productivity.”