Whether it’s a serious illness, a broken leg, or mandated bed rest after a minor op, everyone has been in a situation where they’re sick, worrying about how best to deal with the consequences. Will you be able get a GP appointment? Can you make last minute childcare arrangements if needed?
These worries might not extend to money if you’re a high earner, because while sick, you’re still more likely than most to continue receiving your full pay packet. That’s not the case for about a third of workers in the UK, including those who earn under £15,000 a year, who are disproportionately women and young people and who do not have the benefit of occupational sick pay. They have an additional question to consider: how will I afford the basics on just £118.75 per week?
So, the worry becomes centred on a choice, either go to work while sick, or forego the money needed to spend on bills, food and rent. At barely 17% of the average weekly wage in the UK, for someone working full-time on minimum wage, that could mean a drop of hundreds a week the moment they fall ill. Why is it that in the one of the richest countries in the world, falling sick means being pushed into poverty pay?
It’s no great revelation that the current sick pay system is outdated and unfit for purpose. It doesn’t provide the security people need, and it doesn’t meet the needs of a modern workforce. It is less a safety net, more a trap.
We know that the economic case is clear too, because an ill, distracted or anxious workforce is less productive, more prone to delayed recovery, and a much more likely vector for illness. The response to the pandemic taught us that much.
While successive governments have grappled with the issue and failed to enact even the most basic reforms, a Labour government in its first 100 days tabled the biggest upgrade to worker’s rights in a generation, including sick pay.
It would be remiss of us not to celebrate this, but my message to ministers is why stop there? Why not capture the ambition we promised to workers and go further and faster to secure sick pay as the lifeline it is?
Even today, under the new earnings replacement rate of 80%, there are around 300,000 people earning close to the previous earnings limit who could be worse off compared to what they’d receive under the old system. We cannot let this happen.
That’s why I tabled two amendments to the Employment Rights Bill when it was in front of us in the House of Commons, one to bring statutory sick pay into line with the national living wage, and another to ensure that no worker is worse off today than they were under the previous rules.
These amendments weren’t selected, but the principle enjoys cross-party support from across the House, and hammers home that this isn’t a party-political issue, it is one that should unite all those who want to see workers on a liveable wage especially whilst at their most vulnerable.
The reality is that it is the most vulnerable who will lose out under the new rules unless ministers intervene. Those who are ill for more than four weeks will receive less because of receiving the earnings replacement rate instead of the previous flat rate of statutory sick pay. They are the workers who are in recovery from surgery, those with chronic health conditions, and those in cancer recovery. No worker should be punished in these circumstances.
As I said in parliament a few weeks ago, the debate on sick pay is one of a number of contentions we now face, but we must get it right today so that all workers can benefit, and so that we can live up to the ambition of a Labour government that the country voted for just eight months ago.
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