Lewes Forum thread

Have heard that a certain sandwich shop in Lewes is looking for staff and only offering £ 5.00/ hour ! And this was def offered to an adult ie over 21 ! Shame. Oh and illegal...our national minimum wage is currently £6.08 / hour isn't it?

It is. There are two things you could do. The first would be to challenge the employer, who may not understand their obligations. The second would be to take the job and then claim the outstanding amount via HMRC's NMW enforcement. I think, unless you're sure they're aware of the law, that I'd try the first option initially!

Whistle-blower - Will you let us know the name of the shop so we can at least avoid it till we hear it is obeying the law.

Which is more important - that the shop obeys the law or that a job is created? It might just be that stark choice.
Cue lots of 'brother workers' rubbish from Clifford..
Flame suit on!

So 'not from around here', you believe in the exploitation of people then do you. I'm sure you wouldn't do anything for £5 an hour but you expect others to. Pathetic! Oh and yes name the shop so it can be boycotted!

No, but I believe in the creation of jobs. So the question was "which is more important - that the shop obeys the law or that a job is created". You are ignoring that question.
You are assuming that the shop will be forced to employ somebody at min wage when in fact what will probably happen is that they will not employ anybody at all. So who wins in that situation?
Yes I do regularly work for the equivalent of £5 an hour and sometimes less - but also many times I get far more than that. Working sometimes for under a flexible arrangement means I get more overall - now who's pathetic?

You for being a slave to the capitalist system! Fair job for a fair wage and £5 an hour is not a fair wage for anyone. Hardly money you can live on!

not from around here wrote: 'Which is more important - that the shop obeys the law or that a job is created? It might just be that stark choice.'

So you don't mind having to subsidise employers through your taxes? Because that's what happens - you've heard of working tax credits? Tax from one set of workers being used to top up the wages of another set of workers so the employer can pay a low wage.

not from around here wrote: 'You are assuming that the shop will be forced to employ somebody at min wage when in fact what will probably happen is that they will not employ anybody at all. So who wins in that situation?'

How low would you like to see wages go? I suppose you realise your economics is the economics of the mad house? The problem with the economy is insufficient demand - your crazy ideas just encourage that.

not from around here: if you had the good sense to read into the subject, rather than just parroting Tory rhetoric, you would know that there have been very many studies into the impact of the minimum wage, and that there is no conclusive evidence that it leads to reduced employment. Indeed, there are studies which suggest that the minimum wage increases employment by increasing economic demand.

Still, don't you go letting actual evidence get in the way of entrenched belief, eh?

I can't help thinking that a lot of posters on this forum would prefer their sandwich bars to be state owned and sell cabbage soup and beetroot.

I make my own sandwiches before leaving home. If you want the luxury of your food being prepared by others, then you must pay the practical commercial rate.

I won't name the sandwich shop incase the information passed to me is incorrect.
I just really hope that as this is such a small town that they will hear and be shamed into offering the NMW.
My understanding (and this is only hearsay) is that they are saying that effectively its cash in hand, under the counter and therefore the employee won't pay tax so it'll work out roughly the same!!
I run a small business and employ staff and pay them just over NMW and feel that it's the bare minimum you could pay without insulting someone. I'd love to pay my staff more and they certainly deserve it, but the economics of all my overheads and costs don't allow it. I am proud to have created jobs and a business (from which I probably earn about the same as the NMW). I just feel angry that other businesses are flouting the law.
If the shop in question is busy enough to need more staff then they need to factor in the extra staffing costs against their increased turnover in a legitimate way otherwise they shouldn't be in business...

I wouldn't, Pete. However I am keen that whoever might be serving me in a shop, a restaurant or wherever should be paid at least the minimum wage, which, allow me to remind you, is the law of the land.

I run a small business myself. I would not dream of employing someone and not paying a fair wage. If for some reason there might be times when my business could not support paying both me and an employee a fair wage, then I should take the hit, not my employee. That's because it's my business and I stand to benefit from its success in a way which no employee would.

The National Minimum Wage is already very low indeed. Shame on any employer who thinks it's too high.

Whistleblower, we cross posted.

That's absolutely disgusting. Why don't they go the whole hog and suggest that the workers stays on JSA?

I hope someone does take the job and then shops them to HMRC. Not only are they failing to abide by NMW law, they're depriving the exchequer of rightful income. Vile.

Southover Queen Spooky! we must have been typing at the same time-we are saying the same thing

Well we also know that Viva Lewes has taken on an unpaid employee, known as an 'intern', who is expected to not just run errands but also write articles for the magazine. In the old days of journalism, this used to be called a 'traineeship' and was paid. VL say they cannot afford to pay someone. Obviously this means that an intern has to have their own income - either someone else is paying them, or the taxpayer is (in benefits), or, as is more likely, parents or spouse are supporting them. Either way, the employer doesn't pay.
Interesting to see that Arcadia (the company that owns Top Shop etc) has now given backpay for the last year to its unpaid 'interns' who were also being exploited in the same way - given dogsbody work with the promise of more fashion glamour. This after one of the girls went to HMRC.

I suspect Viva Lewes may also come a cropper with HMRC.

Could it be the same sandwich shop in Market Street that usually has a notice up wanting "Experienced staff only", suggesting they can't persuade staff to stick around for more than five minutes and can't even be bothered to train someone to make a sandwich? Some shops seem happy to sacrifice repeat custom by chiseling a pound or two per hour from the staff cost, illegally. Re Viva Lewes, it's a small, dedicated team who don't make much money while offering a free (and fantastic) service to the town. Sadly, interns are needed to keep such businesses going when so many people expect their reading matter for nothing these days. As for the interns, they can see it as a free and very useful extension to their highly expensive (and often pointless) college education

Mr Gladstone - so on the one hand you criticise a sandwich shop for not paying NMW, on the other hand, you support unpaid interns ? Maybe the sandwich shop should just advertise for an intern, then !!!

I wonder how all the people who think flouting the minimum wage is ok feel about people from other countries coming to the UK and undercutting wages?

For facks sake all this talk about exploitation If you've ever bought something made in china ie the apple product you're reading this on, then believe me you're part of the problem

Yes, well on that analysis we'd all stop buying anything imported or made in any country outside of the US and Europe. Some states have laws against exploitation and the UK is one of them.

Oddly enough the checks and balances against abuse consist mainly of ordinary people speaking out against them and making a fuss. That will work just as well in a small town like Lewes as it does against Apple and all the other companies trying to screw down prices.

expoiltation is out of order in all countries, in Britain it is legislated against because we have seen an industrial revolution that literally killed people in its urge for profit..China is suffering the same fate now in its apple factories,how long before the pot explodes as it did in Europe after the 1870s ( the beginning of chartism)
The point here is that in Britain today if you are paid the minimum wage for a full time week your pay before tax and NI is just over £9000 a year. Before some smart *rse tells little people to work harder just don't bother please, it just makes you sound callas and uninformed about who faught for your rights to everything you take for granted, including the minimum wage.
Try living off that in Lewes.

Well, maybe Lewes is ahead of the game again !! The NMW obviously isn't working across Europe, the unemployment rate is growing at an alarming rate in all countries. If folk want to work for a lesser rate or the employer wants to offer a lower rate, why cant they. Its not a police state, or is it ?? But they can offer interns - doesn't make sense to me !!

Many internships are against the law - that's why Arcadia suddenly coughed up. Basically if you're doing a job of work with set tasks and times you should be paid unless you're working for a charity (and even then the conditions are very strict).

The minimum wage amounts to less than £60 per day: hardly a king's ransom. Desperate young people will take jobs unpaid if they're promised that it will benefit them - that basically amounts to something like blackmail. "If you don't do this work unpaid we will not employ you" There are certain sectors where young people/new entrants will work for nothing for months in a futile attempt to gain a foothold - journalism and the media, for instance, or fashion. Did you know that there is one very well known fashion house where the entire workforce labours unpaid? Out of a staff of 25 just three are paid (and I'm sure they're paid very handsomely - you'll spend thousands on a garment)

What this is doing is limiting access to sought after occupations to those whose parents can bankroll them through years of penury. It means that young people from low income homes are just drones who can forget doing anything positive with their lives, because they can't compete.

This should be a very basic thing in a civilised society. If you want someone to work for you you should pay them a living wage. In times like these, setting a bare minimum is a good idea, it seems to me, because there are a lot of selfish sharks out there keen to line their pockets at the expense of desperate youth.

Another knock-on effect SQ is that the best people for the job, don't necessarily get the job. Thus, businesses operate inefficiently and don't thrive as well as they could had they employed the best available. By 'employing' freebies, they can stifle their own growth.
I vaguely recall when the the NMW was being formulated, one of the committee members peevishly questioned the point as he'd never heard of anybody earning such a ridiculously low wage.

Just a note, If you employ people on short term contracts,( not sure how short but 3months max rings a bell)and they have random working hours then they can be employed as self employed , which means no NMW. Just the way around the system.Its easy to check the full details on HMRC websites.
Btw I pay all my staff above the NMW + bonus

Brixton Belle, I'm sure you can see the difference between a month or two working as an intern to learn a business where there is huge demand to get into, and a permanent, unskilled job paying under the NMW.

Very good point, Expat.

Harold, that's not really true, and I've added a link to the HMRC site which should act as a basic guide. You have to be really careful accepting cash in hand or dodging tax and NI because HMRC can and will come after you (and your employer).

It is true though that the genuinely self-employed are not governed by NMW legislation. Essentially, they're entitled to set a price for the work which can be zero if they wish. However in most cases anyone who is in a junior or training position will not qualify as self-employed - and as we all know ignorance of the law (particularly for an employer) is no defence.

'I won't name the sandwich shop incase the information passed to me is incorrect.'
Well done Whistle Blower, another lengthy tedious thread with no substance to the original post.

Mr Gladstone, I certainly can see the difference. However I'd say that there's a big flaw in your argument. Most interns in high demand industries (the creative sector, for instance) are not "learning a business". They're doing scut work which no-one else wants to do because they've been promised a job "if they do well". And it doesn't last a month, and nor do they get a job at the end of it, typically. Most young people attempting to get an entry level job in the media will work for many months unpaid accumulating "experience", without which they are, they're told, unemployable.

Once upon a time an employer would interview a bunch of hopefuls, choose the best and then train him or her while paying them a wage. This was seen as an investment in the future of the company for the reasons that Expat mentions. Now a growing number of employers just operate a revolving door system where unpaid interns come and do the tedious work and are replaced by more unpaid interns. What that means is that there are no paid entry level jobs in many fields any more. That's unethical and, incidentally, illegal. The trouble is that many of the new entrants themselves have effectively been brainwashed into thinking that this is how it must be and that by playing along they're stealing a march on those who can't afford to work unpaid - and they are. They only realise they've been had a couple of years down the line when they realise that the constant undercutting in those industries means that they still can't earn a decent living.

Nobody ever said life was fair. But I think we're making a very big mistake by excluding such a huge number of bright young people from desirable jobs in this way.

Would any interns like to comment?

About two years ago I started looking for a job, I thought getting a job would be easy if I applied everywhere but, of course, I was wrong. I started doing volunteer work wherever I could and worked up a good CV for my age. I would've been prepared to work for much lower than the minimum wage but then again, at my age I didn't have to be paid the minimum wage. After nearly a year I finally found a job which pays borderline NMW. Being just about to leave home for university I have now acquired two jobs in order to prepare myself for the financial onslaught. In that sense, a national minimum wage has benefited me as although I would still be prepared to work for much less (like I suspect many others would) it has given me the financial support for high living costs to come.
In the shop where I now work it has struck me how many people, old enough to be my parents in fact are desperately seeking a job similar to the pay of the NMW. After having seem them, some supporting families, I would assume they would be prepared to work for a lower wage had it not been for the amount of benefits they receive by not working.
In terms of the bracket of young people that figures show are so highly unemployed I would confidently say that it is not a matter of a shortage of demand for labour but a shortage of the supply of labour. A solution to this which is currently being employed in Germany where unemployment levels are ok is to have a lower NMW. This would increase the supply of labour and also decrease production costs, a major reason why the manufacturing industry in the UK is doing so poor at the moment and we are struggling to get out of the recession (unlike countries like Germany)

Good luck to you young. At last someone on this forum who hasn't got a chip on their shoulder.

If the private sector payed the workers a decent wage (i.e. enough to live on) then people would not need to claim benefits in order to be able to live. The problem is the private sector doesn't value its employees and doesn't pay them an adequate wage for their skills and abilities. If the private sector actually paid people the equivalent of what their skills were worth then people would be paid a 'living wage', not just a 'minimum wage', thereby meaning that people would not need to claim benefits in order to survive. The problem is the private sector being interested only in profit, rather than actually caring and supporting their workforce and giving them the means to support themselves.

Bit of a sweeping statement Mr Forks. I work in the private sector and am doing very nicely thank you. Without exception, all my employers have valued and rewarded those who go the "extra mile".