Brighton City College signs up with the Living Wage Campaign

Campaigners aimed to sign up 100 employers by the end of the year – and with City College on board, they’re nearly there.
Frank le Duc reports

One of the biggest employers in Brighton and Hove has signed up with the Living Wage campaign. City College has promised to pay all its staff at least £7.45 an hour. It is joining more than 90 other employers across the area. And those behind the campaign look increasingly likely to achieve their goal of signing up a hundred corporate supporters by the end of the year.

The campaign has been spearheaded locally by the Brighton and Hove Chamber of Commerce with the backing of Brighton and Hove City Council. The public sector is well represented in the list of those agreeing to the campaign’s laudable aims. But so is the private sector, with Brighton and Hove Buses, law firms Dean Wilson and Mayo Wynne Baxter and charities such as Rockinghorse also on board.

Opponents – and there are some – have come mostly from the private sector and most vocally from the hospitality and tourism trade. They already have to pay the statutory national minimum wage which goes up next week from £6.19 an hour to £6.31. Experts say that this is not enough for people who live somewhere as expensive as Brighton and Hove. Employees would need to earn £7.45 or about £15,000 a year to have a living wage.

One campaign supporter said: “The benefits of the living wage for the city are huge. We know there are sectors and businesses that can’t sign up right now but we hope that they’ll work towards it.” She hoped that the Labour Party conference, which ends on Wednesday 26 September, would provide opportunities to restate the case for a living wage. After all, Labour introduced the minimum wage.

Then again David Cameron said: “It is an idea whose time has come.” And it is an idea that appears to have cross-party support nationally and locally. The Greens included it in their mid-term report of achievements. They are proud that the council pays all staff the living wage or more. Supporters point out that private sector employees who are paid the living wage are less likely to claim state benefits.

One large employer locally cautioned that there were practical difficulties. He said that he supported the idea of the living wage but had a huge number of suppliers, many with long-term supply contracts. He said that those contracts could not suddenly be changed just like that so that suppliers complied. He added that it would take a significant level of resources to check that suppliers were paying staff appropriately. Given the economic climate, he could not justify the level of expense involved.

Myhotel general manager Ben Ferrer, who is also involved in the Brighton and Hove Hoteliers Association and the Tourism Alliance, has spoken out against the living wage. In a debate organised by the Chamber of Commerce last year he warned that higher pay could mean fewer jobs.

He said: “In difficult economic times such as these, to create a program – albeit well intended and voluntary – that stigmatises those who are unable to conform will be detrimental to many leisure businesses already struggling to survive, especially the locally owned and independent businesses for which Brighton and Hove is so famous.”

Chamber of Commerce president Julia Chanteray said during the same debate which was held coincidentally at City College: “There are a number of reasons why paying the living wage – or at least moving towards this figure – can help businesses.
“There’s the old adage, ‘if you pay peanuts, you get monkeys.’ And judging by the customer service in some of the businesses I know are paying below the living wage, some businesses are employing monkeys. Paying a living wage means that you’ll attract better employees.

“And remember what a hassle recruiting new people is. Interviewing, testing, checking references, inductions and training – no business person particularly enjoys these tasks. Paying the living wage means that staff are more likely to stay with you for longer, so you don’t have the hassle of finding new people and training them up.”

It’s taken more than a year to come within touching distance of the milestone of a hundred local employers signing up. Latest, the magazine publisher and local TV broadcaster, is among them. The campaigners remain ambitious and have more firms in their sights. One of the main messages that they will be trying to share is: “It makes sense for people. It makes sense for business.”