Respect for Shopworkers’ Week ended on Friday, just prior to the time of year when even the most reluctant among us start to venture into the hallowed halls of personal consumer capitalism for glitter, baubles and iPad 2s.
During the week itself, Primark announced it has had almost 4,500 people apply for the 500-odd positions available in its new flagship Princes Street store in Edinburgh, part of the council’s ‘string of pearls’ vision for the city’s premier street.
Notwithstanding the closest you’ll get to pearls in Primark will be white gauzy plastic and cost about £2.50 (I know, because they’re one of my favourite pieces of costume jewellery), retail is crucial to the Scottish economy. It’s one of the few sectors still creating jobs, as the oversubscription for positions at Primark shows. The final report, back in March, of research into Assessing the Contribution of Retailing in Scotland, commissioned by Scottish Government, found retail turnover climbed 57% between 1998 and 2008. It now accounts for 5% of Scotland’s gross value added – a measure of GDP in real terms – 10% of its turnover and 10% of employment.
But retail also accounts for a notable proportion of Scotland’s low wage problem. 59% of shopworkers are part-time, 62% are female, half are under 30 and the average weekly salary is £258 – 56% of the Scottish average across all sectors. Together with the hospitality sector, retail across the whole of the UK accounts for almost half of all minimum wage jobs. And the situation isn’t likely to change. Over 2 in 5 of all retail employers have to increase their bottom pay level whenever the minimum wage increases, implying a significant number of retail employees are paid at the very legal minimum. In giving evidence to the Low Pay Commission this month, the Association of Convenience Stores warned further minimum wage increases will result in job losses and decreased hours for staff.
Pay isn’t the only issue. Respect for Shopworkers’ Week, organised by the trade union USDAW, focused on its Freedom from Fear campaign, to prevent violence, threats and abuse against shop workers. But it’s hard to believe the Scottish Government prioritises shop workers. Having dismissed Hugh Henry’s Workers (Aggravated Offences) Scotland private member’s Bill by disagreeing with its fundamental principle last December, the SNP prevented any further consideration of the Bill’s merits. Henry sought to provide a stiffer sentence to anyone assaulting a worker in the course of their duties, including shop workers. The previous Labour-Liberal Democrat coalition weren’t much better, by holding in reserve the extension of powers preventing larger stores opening on Christmas Day to include New Year’s Day as well, as part of Karen Whitefield’s Christmas Day and New Year’s Day Trading (Scotland) Act.
A glimmer of hope is the Scottish Government’s desire to extend the living wage beyond the civil service. A living wage is not just deserved by public sector workers, and compelling the private sector to make the just minimum a realistic reflection of the cost of living for workers in retail is a critical step towards improving low pay across the board.
And there’s an action you can take yourself. Why not resolve this Christmas, and afterwards, to pay heed to what Henry tried to achieve. Be nice, and don’t take out your festive shopping induced fury on the £6.08-an hour worker serving you. Even if that wily Christmas shopper in front just snaffled the last string of Primark pearls.
#1 by Nikostratos on November 14, 2011 - 8:53 pm
my wife works at sainsburys and last week some lads had a fight in the entrance to shop the security guard(O.A.P) could not stop them.
and the as all the male managers had gone home and left the duty manager (a pregnant female ) in charge she was going to try to intervene when the women workers told her to stay away
and leave them get on with it which she did.
After some mayhem they cleared off after all they are just ordinary working people and not bouncers.
#2 by Barbarian on November 14, 2011 - 9:40 pm
Why did the SNP disagree with Hugh Henry’s policy?
Shop workers suffer appalling abuse at times. Then there is the issue of professional shoplifting gangs and families, someof whom can be rather intimidating.
Anyone threatening staff working should be punished. It happens on public transport and in call centres (I know of at least two successful prosecutions for threatening behaviour over the phone). Why not in shops?
Let’s start having some harsher punishments for those who abuse people who are simply trying to earn enough to live.
#3 by Indy on November 15, 2011 - 9:44 am
Basically there was legislation passed to give added protection to Emergency Workers – to make it an aggravated offence to attack them. The logic of that is clear to me – if someone thows rocks at a fire engine, for example, they are only endangering the lives of fire fighters they are impeding them dealing with the fire.
What Hugh Henry’s bill was not all that clear to me and the committee felt that existing laws against assault etc were sufficient.
#4 by gung ho on November 14, 2011 - 11:31 pm
It’s totally untrue to say that the SNP ‘disagreed with the fundamental principles’ of Hugh Henry’s Bill. The fatal problem with Hugh Henry’s Bill was that it was out of date. He was trying to extend harsher punishments outlined in the Emergency Workers Act 2005 to public-facing workers, but these had already been superseded by the toughening of sentences relating to the common law offence of assault in (I think) 2007. That’s why no one is being prosecuted under the EWA. There was simply no point in passing it as it added nothing new.
I, on the other hand, do object to the fundamental principles of the Bill. The EWA was trying to prevent emergency workers being impeded from doing their job, on the basis that doing so could quite probably be putting the lives of people who they are trying to help at risk. It was nothing to do with the workers themselves; rather those that they were trying to help. Why should I, someone who works in an office, be given any less protection from assault than someone whose job involves dealing with the public? If a colleague decides to assault me for carrying out my job (as opposed to a member of the public) why is that less of an assault?
#5 by Erchie on November 15, 2011 - 1:21 am
I could be remembering incorrectly, but I believe the committee’s reason for not supporting the Bill was that existing legislation existed that covered this, and that enforcing that and amplifying existing powers would be better protection than Mr Henry’s Bill
I also believe another point was made, on this and other legislation, that it was wrong to have, enacted in law, any notion that one person was worth more than another, So Police outrank firemen, who outrank nurses, who outrank railway employees, who outrank DWP clerks who outrank shopworkers who outrank the rest of us in the scale of things as far as assault goes
That’s what I remember at any rate
#6 by Doug Daniel on November 15, 2011 - 12:27 pm
Why let facts get in the way of a good smear story though?