The national minimum wage is predicted to increase by up to 6% next year, according to reports.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves is expected to announce the raise in tomorrow’s budget, which could see more than a million low-paid workers receive a pay boost well above inflation rates.
Younger workers are also set to recieve an even bigger increase as part of a push to ensure 18-20 year olds are paid the same as those over 21.
However, despite ministers hailing the move as good news for ‘working people’, business have warned the impact could be negated by an expected increase in national insurance contributions from wages.
Around 1.6 million people currently recieve the ‘national living wage’ of £11.44 an hour, which is the minimum wage for over-21s. This is set to rise to £12.12 after the government promised to ‘raise the floor’ on wages.
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Health Secretary says NHS is ‘not on its knees, but on its face’
Health Secretary Wes Streeting has said the NHS is ‘not just on its knees, it’s on its face’ and that though the Chancellor is prioritising the health service, a single Budget will not turn it around.
‘There’s no beating about the bush about it – whether it’s the size of the waiting list, the fact that people can’t guarantee an ambulance turns up on time, the struggle to get a GP appointment or a dentist, the waits in A&E, the NHS is not just on its knees, it’s on its face,’ he told GB News.
The money coming in the Budget will allow the health service to double the number of scanners and start cutting NHS waiting lists in line with Labour’s manifesto pledges, he said.
‘I think people are realistic. They know that we’re not going to turn the NHS around in just a few months or in a single budget.
‘It’s going to take time and that’s why the Chancellor is prioritising the NHS in her Budget.
‘We are linking that investment also to reform, because everything I said in opposition about waste and inefficiency in the NHS, the need to improve productivity, and we can’t keep on pouring more money in without reform – all of those things stand.’
He added: ‘Whether it’s health tourism, whether it’s the right staff in the right place, waste, inefficiency, bureaucracy, beyond the Budget I’ll be setting out steps in the coming weeks to make sure that as well as the extra investment going in being linked to reform, we also take a long, hard look at where money is currently spent in the NHS.’
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