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Covid-19: UK picks up private sector’s 80% wage bill
The announcement by chancellor Rishi Sunak is the latest initiative to deal with the challenge, for which the government already committed over £330 billion pounds last week.
For the first time in British history, the Boris Johnson government has announced that it will pay 80 per cent of any employee’s salary up to £2,500 a month to prevent companies from laying off their workforce due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The announcement by chancellor Rishi Sunak is the latest initiative to deal with the challenge, for which the government already committed over £330 billion pounds last week. Business organisations welcomed the wages initiative described as ‘unprecedented’.
Sunak said: “I can announce that, for the first time in our history, the government is going to step in and help to pay people’s wages. We’re setting up a new Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme. Any employer in the country – small or large, charitable or non-profit - will be eligible for the scheme”.
“Government grants will cover 80% of the salary of retained workers up to a total of £2,500 a month – that’s above the median income…That means workers in any part of the UK can retain their job, even if their employer cannot afford to pay them, and be paid at least 80% of their salary”.
As pubs, restaurants, theatres and other establishments were closed across the UK, Sunak announced more steps on VAT and other taxes, and added that the scheme will cover the cost of wages backdated to March 1 and will be open initially for at least three months.
“I will extend the scheme for longer if necessary. I am placing no limit on the amount of funding available for the scheme. We will pay grants to support as many jobs as necessary…We have never had a scheme in our country like this before”.
As of 9am on Friday, the UK had 3,983 coronavirus cases; 177 patients died.
Calling for compassion and helping others, Sunak said: “When this is over, and it will be over, we want to look back at this moment and remember the many small acts of kindness done by us and to us”.
“We want to look back this time and remember how we thought first of others and acted with decency. We want to look back on this time and remember how, in the face of a generation-defining moment, we undertook a collective national effort - and we stood together. It’s on all of us”.
