Commenting on the publication today
(Thursday) of a Work and Pensions Committee report on whether the
government should reform statutory sick pay to provide more
financial support to low-paid employees, TUC General
Secretary Paul
Nowak said:
“The Covid-19 pandemic showed that our
sick pay system is in desperate need of
reform.
“It beggars belief that ministers have
done nothing to fix sick pay since.
“It’s a disgrace that so many low-paid
and insecure workers up and down the country – most of them women
– have to go without financial support when
sick.
“The committee is right that ministers
urgently need to remove the lower earnings limit and raise the
rate of sick pay.
“Wider reform is also needed to remove
the three days people must wait before they get any sick pay at
all.
“Working people deserve
better.
“It's time for a new deal for workers,
like Labour is proposing – which includes stronger sick pay and a
ban on zero hours contracts.”
Analysis published
by the TUC in January revealed that 1.3 million people do not
earn enough to qualify for statutory sick pay – and 70% are
women.
And zero-hours contract workers are
eight times more likely than those on secure contracts (30.3%
compared to 3.6%) to miss out on statutory sick pay because they
don’t earn enough to qualify.
ENDS
Notes to
editors:
- Statutory sick pay: Statutory sick pay is currently just £109.40 per week –
equivalent to just 17% of average earnings (it will be uprated in
April in line with inflation). And there is a three-day
waiting period before those eligible start getting statutory sick
pay. This brings the amount for the first week for someone
working a typical five-day week to £44, which is just 7% of
average weekly earnings: https://www.tuc.org.uk/news/women-more-twice-likely-men-miss-out-statutory-sick-pay.
The TUC believes that the three-day waiting period should be
removed, as increasing statutory sick pay with waiting days still
in place substantially reduces workers’ entitlements during their
first week of sickness. .
