PAY: What is the minimum wage and how much is it?

By Bill Heaney

The national living wage will increase from next April, Chancellor Jeremy Hunt is to confirm on Monday.

It means the minimum wage for workers aged 23 and over is expected to rise from £10.42 to at least £11 an hour.

That would boost the pay of about two million people.

A woman who appeared as an extra in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire has revealed she got paid barely anything for the role.

For most children – and quite a few adults – being an extra on a magical Harry Potter epic would be nothing short of a dream.

But Samantha Clinch, who is a former child actress from London, divulged the extras worked long hours and were only paid £35 a day, in stark contrast to Daniel Radcliffe, who received $11 million for playing the protagonist in the highest grossing international film of 2005.

In her viral TikTok video, that now has over 3.5 million views, Ms Clinch elaborated about life on set.

The minimum wage – known officially as the National Living Wage – varies according to the age of the employee.

Since 1 April 2023, the rates are:

The apprentice rate applies to people aged under 19, or people over 19 in the first year of their apprenticeship.

The chancellor is set to confirm the minimum wage will rise to at least £11 an hour at the Tory conference.

The Conservatives say this would increase the annual earnings of a full-time worker on the national living wage by £1,000 next year.

The minimum wage is the same across all parts of the UK.

The retail, care and hospitality sectors account for a large number of minimum-wage jobs, although they are found in many other parts of the economy too.

The UK national minimum wage sets out the lowest amount that workers above school-leaving age can be paid per hour by law.

Any employer not paying the minimum wage can be fined by the UK tax authority, HMRC.

If you think you should be getting the minimum wage and aren’t, you can complain via the HMRC website. You can also get advice from the Acas website or by calling its helpline on 0300 123 1100.

In June, the government confirmed more than 200 firms had been fined nearly £7 million and told to reimburse 63,000 workers for breaches dating back over a decade.

Companies involved include WH Smith, Marks & Spencer, Argos and Lloyds Pharmacy.

WH Smith was the worst offender, having failed to pay more than £1 million to more than 17,600 workers.

The rates are decided each year by government and based on the advice of an independent advisory group, the Low Pay Commission.

Its recommendations reflect how many people are in work, what’s happening to earnings and how much people are having to pay for essentials such as food and housing.

People who don’t qualify include:

People with disabilities or those in long-term unemployment who take part in a government work programme are paid fixed amounts at different stages of the scheme, which are less than the minimum wage.

Work done by prisoners is paid at a minimum of £4 a week, while students on work placements of less than a year as a required part of their studies are not entitled to be paid anything.

The law to introduce the minimum wage was passed in 1998 by the Labour government and it came into force the following year.

It started at £3.60 for those 22 and older, and £3.00 for 18-21 year olds.

Before the minimum wage was introduced, the lowest-paid people consistently saw the slowest growth in their wages.

Before the minimum wage was introduced, there was concern that it would cost jobs, because employers would compensate for their higher wage bill by hiring fewer people.

But this didn’t turn out to be the case.

There’s no evidence of an overall loss of jobs linked to the minimum wage, and only weak evidence of negative impacts on some groups of workers.

More than 430,000 workers benefit from the voluntary “Real Living Wage”, which is set by the Living Wage Foundation charity.

It’s above the level of the legal minimum wage, reflecting what the charity thinks people need to earn to cover everyday needs.

It is currently £11.95 per hour in London, and £10.90 per hour elsewhere in the UK.

The number of Living Wage-accredited employers has more than doubled to 12,500 in the past two years, and includes Ikea, Aviva, Nationwide and Burberry.