1,000 council workers to remain on pay below living wage

Some 1,015 workers or contractors for Walsall Council are currently below the living wage of £7.65 compared to the minimum wage of £6.31.

Calls have been made for the authority to increase their pay to the living wage level which is calculated according to the basic cost of living.

But authority bosses say it would cost £320,000 a year just to pay the council workers.

And council leader Mike Bird says bosses would then have to pay contractors for services including social care - which would see the annual wage bill rocket by at least £2 million.

The figures obtained from the council's financial department revealed the majority of workers earn a rate of pay at or above the living wage.

However, there are 1,015 posts which are graded below it, including 640 in schools.

Councillor Bird said: "At this point in time I think it is absolutely unlikely that the council could introduce the living wage. We will look at it when we the budget is drawn up but it would cost a lot of money .The £320,000 is enough, but it would end up as £2 million in reality."

Neighbouring Wolverhampton City Council has already shelled out £7 million introducing the wage as part of the arrangements to settle an issue called Single Status, a national scheme set up 16 years ago to iron out decades of pay inequality between men and women in councils.

A report last month by the Living Wage Commission, revealed professional service firms such as accountancy, banks and construction companies could boost the pay of 375,000 workers if they agreed to pay the living wage.

Unions launched a major campaign last year for a minimum increase of £1 an hour to increase the bottom rate of pay in local government to raise it to a living wage hourly rate.

The GMB Union claims around 500,000 town hall workers nationally are paid below the current living wage.

Politicians from all parties have recently called for action to deal with low pay and are encouraging individual local authorities to pay the living wage.

Town hall workers are paid from council budgets that are funded partly by government grants and council tax bills.

Walsall Councillor Peter Smith said the money needed to ensure everyone who worked for the council is receiving at least a minimum wage is 'manageable.'

He said: "Although there would be a cost to implementing the living wage for those Walsall Council employees the cost, around £320,000, is manageable, given that Walsall Council spends well over £600 million pound per year.

"In my view it would be a price worth paying."

However Councillor Bird added: "I have looked at this before but we have to bear in mind that there are pressures with budgets so it will be considered alongside those.

"If we paid the internal staff the living wage then we would have to extend that to staff with contracts that provide services for us and it would cost more than £2 million a year."

Employers pay the living wage voluntarily.