The Growth Hub is joining others across the nation to promote Living Wage Week this week.
The annual celebration runs from November 6-12 to raise awareness of the benefits of the Real Living Wage. It comes just two weeks after the announcement of a new Living Wage rate, which is now £12 outside of London.
In Cornwall and IOS, 28.4% of all employees are paid below the Real Living Wage, compared to 20.2% for the UK. Cornwall Council’s analysis of low wages illustrates that work does not pay for almost 4 out of 10 people, which is an estimated 68,000 employees.
To help turn the tide of Cornwall’s low pay, the Good Growth Programme is asking all recipients of funding to commit to paying the Real Living Wage.
As a commissioned project of the Good Growth Programme, Growth Hub has £10 million of grant funding for businesses looking to grow in Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly, and employers looking for investment will also need to adopt the Real Living Wage.
Kirsty Miles-Musgrave, investment operations manager at the Growth Hub, said: “We are excited to have more than 500 grants to invest with businesses to grow the local economy, and each one will commit to paying their staff the Real Living Wage.
“In the first year of grant funding, 57 businesses in receipt of grants were paying the Real Living Wage or committed to pay the Real Living Wage by December next year.”
