BIS will name'n'shame Scrooge bosses

The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills is to name and shame businesses which fail to pay the minimum wage. Employers have three months to get their houses in order. From 1 January 2011 the Department will make public the names of firms which fail to meet minimum requirements. HMRC and BIS today published their …

[Richard 116]

Good for them

As an employer I welcome this. I'm sick of trying to compete with businesses that don't pay at least the minimum wage and just seem to get away with it.

[Anonymous Coward]

@Richard 116

I'm glad to hear an employer in agreement. I've never understood why 'the big boys' and the Tories were so opposed to the minimum wage because it basically meant that the country (through benefits to under paid employees) was subsidising badly run/unprofitable businesses and unscrupulous bosses.

[DT]

this wasn't being enforced before?

it's great how the government can say they're against age discrimination in the workplace... then propose different levels of minimum wage arbitrated on the basis of age.

[Anonymous Coward]

Because

They (or the last lot at leased) fear big buisness to much. They say that it is because younger people are "in training", like any minium wage job needs more than 10 mins.

The same thing with the working time directive. They won't sign up to it because companys want to work people to death, but say "people don't have to work long hours" and "some people want to" without taking any notice of the fact that most people are forced to opt out and we have all sorts of problems with the long hours that need to be worked in the UK for you to be seen as a "good" worker.

[Anonymous Coward]

@DT

It could also be seen as an incentive to hire young, unskilled workes so they get that valuable work experience (or as exploitation depending on your point of view).

[JaitcH]

Name and Shame? Shame on the BIS - charge the cheapskates

The law stipulates a minimum payment - likely totally inadequate for basic living and these OFFENDERS are going to be SHAMED into paying.

Do the right thing, charge and fine them then have the court award the missing payments + interest in the sentencing and hold the company officers responsible personally.

[Whitter]

Name and shame?

Name and shame?

How about Prosecute, sanction and fine?

[cosymart]

Long list...

Well there's most of the restaurants in the London area to start with. High prices low wages, money grabbing gits!

[Jacqui]

garage forcourt workers

many still only get 4UKP per hour.

[Gangsta]

4P?

4 Pence per hour...

Surely you must mean 4 Pounds Sterling per hour!

or 4GBP

or £4

-Sorry grammar nazi alert.

(OT: don't you just hate it when people call themselves grammar Nazis but proceed to spell grammar; "grammer"? )

[Anonymous Coward]

BIS

How disappointing that it turns out to be the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, and not the perky mid-90's Scottish indie pop band.

[kissingthecarpet]

Should be a living wage

for the area its paid. It costs loads more to live in London, than say Middlesbrough, because of rents and so on.

<rant>Remember when the topic was first broached.... all the CBI types moaned like the clappers & claimed they'd all go out of business. They didn't. anyway, if you can't run a business & pay your employees a living wage then you go out of business, simple as that. It might not be a fashionable view, but that doesn't make it any less true that the profits taken by the owners of a business are what's left of the value the employees have created once they've been paid. They deserve nearly all this - managers should only be paid in relation to the amount of surplus value they have created. I imagine that this would be a small sum if it were in line with reality - how much profit does your boss generate for the business - not much would be my guess.</rant>

[Snowy]

The title is required, and must contain letters and/or digits.

What is the point of have a minimum pay rate if it not backed up by the law, naming and shaming is not going to make them pay it. Fining them 10 times the amount they under pay might.

[Destroy All Monsters]

Anyone care to explain...

...what the minimum wage is actually for except as a social feel-good measure?

Do employers actually hold a monopoly so that they manage to avoid their employees drifting off to higher-paying jobs?

Now, if those employees were illegals, or unable to read the job offer pages or if they were actually doing a job that generates rock-bottom additional value (below the minimum wage), I would have an explanation. But otherwise??

Note that minimum wage legislation kills off those rock-bottom additional value jobs, in other words some things you have to yourself, or hire students at 0/hour.

[Anonymous Coward]

@Anyone care to explain . . .

I don't see why the whole country should subsidise (through benefits to underpaid employees) jobs that don't add sufficient value to be profitable in themselves. If these jobs are killed off either they the job is no longer required, people will do it for themselves or the perceived value will rise to the point where a 'proper' wag can be paid.

I particularly object to (unscrupulous?) bosses making a profit on the subsidy that the rest of us are paying for - as other posters have noted.

[Clyde]

BIS ?

BIS - I thought "what's Blackberry Internet Service" got to do with scrooge bosses ?

As others have said, it's been law for years now. How come anybody gets away with it ? Is it because low paid workers are too afraid of losing their jobs if reports are made ?

Is it because low paid workers are also claiming benefits and thus scared for themselves ?

[Dave Harris]

Name & Shame?

Prosecute the bastards, to the full extent

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course

it could just be an incentive (like happens in many places) for them to hire people under 18, let them work until they reach 18 then lay them off and replace them with the next batch of under-18s.

Not that I know a place that does this at all

[Anonymous Coward]

Minimal impact

Those companies getting away with this will be able to pay image consultants less than they steal from their workforce to repair the damage. Will newspapers be willing to publish lists of their law-breaking advertisers in more than a 6-pt font? Probably not.