On November 15, the Living Wage Foundation announced the newly adjusted Real Living Wage rates. The nationwide rate, which applies to Brighton and Hove, was raised by 40 pence to £9.90 per hour. Living Wage employers have until 1st April 2022 to match the new rate, which is recalculated each year by the Resolution Foundation as cost of living changes.
To celebrate, the Brighton & Hove Living Wage Campaign hosted a virtual networking event with Living Wage employers on November 18. A variety of sectors were represented, including charity, care, hospitality, digital, and finance.
Attendees heard from four speakers. Brighton Chamber CEO Sarah Springford talked about the history of the Brighton & Hove Living Wage Campaign. “Brighton is unique,” Sarah said, “in that it has a Living Wage Campaign run as a collaboration between the Chamber, the City Council, and a trade Union.”
The two sponsors of the Brighton & Hove Living Wage Campaign are Brighton and Hove City Council and Unison Brighton and Hove. Retired Unison member Sue Bowes said Unison supports the Living Wage Campaign because “We want people to earn decent wages” to afford to live in Brighton and Hove. Council Leader Phelím Mac Cafferty told employers present “I hope you’ll be able to spread the news to other employers about the benefits of the Living Wage.”
St. John’s School and College is a recent sign-up to the Living Wage Campaign. HR Manager Christine McFee highlighted how the history and strategic goals of St. John’s align with paying employees the Real Living Wage. Despite the unique challenges of the charity sector, Christine said “St. John’s plans to implement the adjusted new living wage by December, so that we can retain our excellent staff and attract new talent.”
The Brighton & Hove Living Wage Campaign hopes to reach 800 employer signups in 2022. It’s free to sign up and takes less than 5 minutes. If you’d like to join the Brighton & Hove’s Living Wage employers, head to the campaign’s website today!
Do follow us on social media for all the latest on the campaign and its growing number of employers.
Twitter: @BHLivingWage
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LinkedIn: Brighton & Hove Living Wage Campaign
At Legends, we are simply passionate about creating opportunities and supporting our amazing team. Our team members are the face of our business and we believe we have a responsibility to treat them fairly. Paying people a living wage greatly benefits the community by allowing local people to live and work in the city and…
We believe that staff are our greatest assets. Therefore we need to treat our staff with respect by paying a wage that people can live on. Furthermore by being part of this campaign we are also putting pressure on the government to implement a fair system for all.
Because everyone has the right to be able to earn a wage that they can actually live on and because it's the right thing to do.
Quintessence committed to paying our colleagues the Living Wage 3 years ago and pledge to continue doing so. We believe in supporting our colleagues in a variety of ways and financial wellbeing is always high on our agenda which is why we our teams are paid well above the living wage.
It's a basic human right to feel safe and to thrive. We support the campaign as it's the right thing to do!
