Minimum wage up to over £5 an hour from tomorrow

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Manufacturing News, Source : TheManufacturer.com
Published : 30 Sep 2005 11:03
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The national minimum wage will rise to more than £5 per hour tomorrow (Saturday, 1 October), guaranteeing a pay increase for 1.3 million low paid workers, many of them working in the manufacturing industries.

The adult rate of the minimum wage will increase from £4.85 to £5.05 per hour, while the youth rate, paid to 18-21 year-olds, will go up from £4.10 per hour to £4.25.

The rate for 16 and 17 year old workers, introduced last year, will remain at £3 an hour, although that will reviewed by the low pay commission in February next year.

Industry minister Alan Johnson said that since the minimum wage came into force in 1999, over a million low paid workers had benefited each year.

"This means we have protected some of our most vulnerable members of society from exploitative employers. Tomorrow's increase will make a real difference to the lives of the lowest paid members of our workforce," he said.

When the National Minimum Wage was launched in 1999 the main rate was £3.60 an hour and the 18-21 year-old rate was £3 an hour.

The manufacturers organisation EEF has consistently argued in its evidence to the low pay commission that future increases in the minimum wage should be determined by a formula, based on retrospective movements in basic rates of pay across the economy. This, it says, would enable manufacturers to plan for the resultant impact that these increases will inevitably have on their costs and remuneration structures through the need to maintain pay differentials.

David Yeandle, EEF deputy director of employment policy, said: "Whilst most manufacturers will be able to live with this increase, they continue to believe that a pre-determined formula should be used to set further increases."