For too long, UK workers have laboured under a set of shocking double standards. Work that is physical, dirty, or dangerous often leaves people with the weakest rights. Desk-based jobs, meanwhile, are more likely to offer higher pay, better benefits and, crucially, proper sick pay.
The Covid-19 pandemic exposed the UK’s inadequate sick pay safeguards, as so many needlessly died. We all stood, clapped and championed key workers. Yet under the previous government, these same workers were then hit with a cost of living crisis and eroding workplace protections. That’s why this Labour government’s effort to raise the living standards of working people, through the employment rights bill, is such an important mission — and as recent polling by the TUC has found, a popular one.
There is much good news in the employment rights bill to share with workers, but for those people who fall ill and take a period of time off through no fault of their own, we may be missing an opportunity here. An estimated one third of the workforce either get the legal minimum ‘statutory sick pay’ of £116 a week from day four of an illness (the first three days are unpaid). Millions more don’t qualify as they are low waged. The employment rights bill going through parliament has sought to address some problems with the current system, including making sure sick pay is paid from day one and available to lower earners, but as Baroness O’Grady and Baroness Lister explained in the House of Lords on Monday the bill does not improve the all important level of income someone gets if they fall ill, leaving many hard working people short of support at their lowest moment.
I first came across the problem with the system before I was an MP, when my wife and I bought a fish and chip shop in 2003 (and took over an on site canteen in 2020).
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Employing 25 people over two sites, it is a strong and dedicated team that we couldn’t be without. There was no need to even think about sick pay at first, until one day, an employee rang in with a nasty injury. He had broken his leg and needed several weeks off to recuperate. He was worried it would be a huge financial struggle, given that Statutory Sick Pay, then paid at less than £100 a week, was a small fraction of his usual earnings and wouldn’t cover the rent.
As business owners, it made my wife and I stop and think. Like many SMEs we didn’t have a policy on sick pay. We hadn’t needed one. Yet both of us had previously been in career jobs with all the extra benefits: company car, sick leave when needed, and a decent pension. Paying out higher sick pay would come at a cost, but was it really fair for us to leave a valued staff member unable to afford the bills?
We felt it wasn’t. We changed our sick pay policy to offer significantly more than SSP. We decided to absorb the costs of any sickness ourselves as a business and proactively manage any absence. Since then, the business has supported several employees through periods of sickness. Another employee got knocked down by a car on a zebra crossing; she was worried about her rent. We paid her an average weekly wage based on what she had been earning the previous 8 weeks, well in excess of the SSP. She has had a baby, and returned to work for us after her maternity leave.
Coming into parliament with this experience led me to the conclusion — if my business could do it — why can’t others? If sick pay was increased small businesses could certainly do with some help through mechanisms such as a business rebate, but it is simply wrong to argue that working people shouldn’t get these most basic protections many of our European neighbours take for granted. It is also self-defeating. Numerous experts, including most recently the Health Foundation’s Commission for Healthier Working Lives, have found that low wage, low rights environments only hinder economic growth and employment.
The UK, by putting up sick pay more in line with other nations, could see a long term economic boost from better workforce health. WPI Economics, working with the Centre for Progressive Change, found that a Statutory Sick Pay policy that paid 75% of the national Living Wage would realise benefits of over £4 billion a year to business, government and the wider economy.
So I’m proud to join many other fellow MPs and peers in asking the government to build on the strong foundations already in the employment rights bill over this parliament and design a sick pay system that lifts up workers, rather than leaves them behind. The obvious place to start is the Keep Britain Working Review, now being led by former John Lewis boss Sir Charlie Mayfield, which should set out further reforms to SSP in its roadmap for a healthier workforce.
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