Minimum wage brings no rises
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by Karen Miles • Drivers expecting to see their earnings bumped up by the introduction of a minimum wage could face disappointment.
Some employers are likely to avoid paying higher wages by introducing administrative changes which could thwart minimum wage legislation by simply showing higher hourly rates of pay.
By including the more highly paid driving rates—such as overtime, bonus and guaranteed payments—in the overall wage, the average hourly pay rate would rise beyond the driver's basic.
This could mean that the "many thousands" of drivers who the Transport and General Workers Union estimate are paid below £4 an hour would get no real increase, even if a minimum wage was introduced at about that figure.
The introduction of a minimum wage (at a level to be set by the Government's Low Pay Commission) is thought to be at least a year away, but the road transport trade associations have already begun to formulate policy and advice for their members.
The Road Haulage Association says the hourly basic drivers' rates set by its employer and union Joint Industrial Councils is around £4.40 an hour. This is also the figure favoured by the TGWU.
But the RHA expects to be advising members to rejig their payroll structure so non-basic and basic rates are combined and then divided by total hours worked to produce a higher average hourly rate of pay.
"We expect to see a change in the way pay is made up, rather than a change in actual pay or hours," says RHA head of employment Ruth Pott.
The Freight Transport Association says one way of dealing with the minimum wage could be to give a higher basic rate at the expense of other payments.