The Living Wage Foundation has accredited Solarcentury as a Living Wage employer. Solarcentury pays the same minimum hourly salary as other high profile companies including HSBC, Lush, Barclays, Oxfam and Oliver Bonas.
The Living Wage commitment means that people working at Solarcentury receive a minimum hourly wage of £7.85, or £9.15 for those working in London – significantly higher than the national minimum wage of £6.50. This includes permanent employees as well as freelancers, interns and short-term contractors.
The Living Wage is an hourly rate set independently and updated annually. It is calculated according to the basic cost of living using the ‘Minimum Income Standard’ for the UK. Decisions about what to include in this standard are set by the public; it is a social consensus about what people need to make ends meet.
Helen Barlow, HR Director at Solarcentury, said: “This accreditation demonstrates to prospective clients and employees, as well as current Solarcentury people, that we recognise the need for people in the UK to earn a salary that is consistent with the cost of living.
We are encouraging our third-party contractors to join us in adopting the Living Wage too; this involves everyone from the people who clean our offices to the subcontractors at the solar sites we build.
We hope other medium-sized companies will also pay the Living Wage. We are not a large company – 185 people in the UK – and if we can manage it, hopefully others can too!”
Employers choose to pay the Living Wage on a voluntary basis. The Living Wage enjoys cross-party support, with public backing from the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition.
Living Wage Foundation Director, Rhys Moore said: “We are delighted to welcome Solarcentury to the Living Wage movement as an accredited employer. The best employers are voluntarily signing up to pay the Living Wage now. The Living Wage is a robust calculation that reflects the real cost of living, rewarding a hard day’s work with a fair day’s pay.”