Caroline Lucas – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Caroline Lucas on 2016-06-03.

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, pursuant to the Answers of 1 June 2016 to Questions 38139 and 38140, how much of the £10.3 million of minimum wage arrears recovered in 2015-16 was recovered from the 85 employers who did not respond to the National Minimum Wage campaign announced by HM Revenue and Customs on 29 July 2015 but were not issued with a Notice of Underpayment and did not have to pay a penalty; and how many workers were identified as having been underpaid by those 85 employers.

Margot James

In 2015/16 a total of 145 employers found to be non-compliant with National Minimum Wage (NMW) legislation were not issued with a Notice of Underpayment (NoU) or a financial penalty for any of the arrears they owed.

56 of these employers voluntarily disclosed arrears of £742,587 owed to 4875 workers through the campaign announced by HM Revenue & Customs on 29 July 2015.

83 of these employers, owing a combined total of £841,282 to 8768 workers, were not issued with an NoU or penalty for other reasons. For instance, HMRC will not issue a notice of underpayment where complainant workers have entered into a compromise agreement with the employer, or in cases where pay liabilities have been transferred to a new employer under the terms of the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations (1981).

In addition, HMRC were also notified in 2015/16 of a further 6 employers who owed £482,005 of arrears to 412 workers. These were additional arrears related to cases originally closed in 2014/15.