Social Services: Pay

(asked on 4th February 2015) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to the contribution of 7 January 2015 by the Prime Minister, Official Report, columns 270-1, if he will ensure that HM Revenue and Customs is instructed to carry out a new series of proactive investigations into non-compliance with the National Minimum Wage in the care sector in order to prosecute organisations that do not pay their staff properly.


Answered by
Norman Lamb Portrait
Norman Lamb
This question was answered on 9th February 2015

Department of Health officials are working closely with their colleagues at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, and with HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) to support the enforcement of national minimum wage (NMW) in the care sector.

We have asked that HMRC re-start targeted enforcement work in the care sector, to build on the targeted work undertaken with the sector between April 2011 and March 2013.

Criminal investigations by HMRC and prosecutions by the Crown Prosecution Service will be taken in the most serious of cases. Prosecution will not necessarily result in arrears of wages being paid back to the workers. Our number one priority is getting workers the money they are owed and the civil route is more successful in achieving this. Under the civil route employers are not only faced with reputational consequences through naming and shaming but also face a financial penalty for breaking the law.

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