RETAIL REGULATORY
Advisor at RetailTrust, said that retail workers needed more support.
“Retail workers are especially exposed to
Covid-19 related health and wealth risks and, if we are to minimise subsequent harm, we must pull together now to offer support.”
Findings from the Centre for Retail Research, meanwhile, reported in April this year that almost 190,000 workers had lost their jobs as the pandemic put the final nail in the coffin for dozens of beleaguered high street names.
Harrods, Boots and Selfridges, all major beauty outlets, were among the retailers that slashed their staff numbers across head offices and shop floors, and thousands of brick-and-mortar stores never got the opportunity to welcome back customers – or their staff.
But the issues with retail workers’ rights have been manifesting long before Covid-19. USDAW, otherwise known as the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers, a trade union for the retail sector, which includes Tesco, Ocado and Sainsbury’s among its members, has identified low pay as one of the major areas that retail workers are disgruntled by. “Clearly, in parts of the retail sector levels of pay are just not good enough,” Connor Rand, Senior Researcher at USDAW tells Cosmetics Business. “There’s a significant difference in terms of the impact on someone’s life as a worker, for instance, earning over £10 an hour versus someone earning the minimum wage of £8.90 [at the time of writing]: that’s a different lifestyle.
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Retail workers are especially exposed to Covid-19 related health and wealth risks
“Retail work has almost become a byword for low-paid, insecure work, but it’s such a huge employment, one of the biggest private sectors, which is just really surprising,” he adds. “With everything going on on the high street, there’s not really any sense of government investment,
action or retail recovery plan, and I think there’s an overwhelming sense among businesses and employees that there are real problems in retail and no real strategies.”
‘NAMED & SHAMED’
And the pandemic has only exacerbated injustices already felt by some retail workers. Estée Lauder Companies (ELC) staff, 40 in total, went on strike at Ireland’s Dublin Airport in September last year, after it said that 2,000 retail jobs would be cut worldwide, following loss of profits and sales. According to the Mandate Trade Union, which organised the strike against the US-based beauty owner, industrial action was taken to “stop the company rehiring workers on inferior terms and conditions of employment”, an accusation ELC flatly denies.
Speaking at the time of the strike, Robert McNamara, Mandate’s Divisional Organiser, said: “Estée Lauder need to have respect for their
cosmeticsbusiness.com
workers. That means they should negotiate with the workers through their trade union and implement a package that is fair for everyone concerned.
“If Estée Lauder, one of the largest and most profitable enterprises on the planet, can treat their workers this appallingly, then it can happen to anyone.”
And it has happened.
In a list compiled by the UK government earlier this year, which ‘named and shamed’ corporations that were breaking national minimum wage law between 2011 and 2018, a number of salon and beauty business owners up and down the UK were mentioned in the document. Workers were named for underpaying by wrongly deducting wages for uniform expenses; failing to pay workers for all the time they had worked, such as overtime; and for paying the incorrect apprenticeship rate.
Commenting on the findings, Business Minister Paul Scully said that it was “unacceptable” for any company to underpay staff.
“All employers, including those on this list, need to pay workers properly.”
ROCK BOTTOM FOR RETAIL
But the biggest name, and the highest offender, was beauty and fashion department store chain John Lewis. The business, helmed by former Ofcom boss Sharon White, who takes home around £990,000 annually, failed to pay 19,392 workers £941,355. In a statement to Cosmetics Business, a John Lewis spokesperson said that the issue was due to a technical breach that happened four years ago. “The issue arose because the partnership smooths pay so that partners with variable pay get the same amount each month, helping them to budget,” they added.
But, as Rand points out, if retail workers’ salaries can dip below minimum wage when smoothing pay, then that is a clear indication that staff are not being paid enough.
The stalwart retailer has also been accused of paying ‘poverty wages’ by its staff. That was according to a petition launched on the Organise platform in September, which has now been signed by more than 41,000 signatories. The petition accused John Lewis of paying partners less than the Real Living Wage (RLW), even ahead of the RLW increase that took place in November from £9.50 in the UK to £9.90 and from £10.85 to £11.05 in the capital.
In spite of the change, the petition said its ultimate aim was for John Lewis to become a Living Wage Employer.
Prior to the decision to raise RLW standards in the UK last month, the retailer gave Cosmetics Business this statement: “Our average hourly rate of pay for all non-management Partners across the Partnership is £10.32, which is above the current Real Living Wage for the majority of the UK. “Our hourly rates of pay for Partners start from £9.50 – 15% above the national minimum wage –
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