UNION leaders this week welcomed Hounslow Council's decision to pay all staff the London Living Wage but said it could have gone further.
The council agreed last Monday (October 31) to pay all directly employed staff at least £8.30 an hour, a figure set by the Mayor of London as the minimum needed for workers to support themselves in the capital.
Civic Centre bosses claim Hounslow is just the second council after Lambeth to fully implement the LLW, a voluntary figure which is significantly higher than the compulsory minimum hourly wage of £5.93.
Other organisations to adopt the figure include Transport for London, the London Fire Brigade and the Met Police.
The minimum wage will only apply to directly employed council staff, not those working for schools or council contractors.
It will affect just 44 posts, most of which are part-time, and is estimated to cost just over £14,000 a year.
A council spokesman refused to reveal which positions would be affected, for reasons of confidentiality, but said the workers affected were earning between £7.83 and £8.11 an hour.
Councillor Steve Curran, cabinet member for education, housing and corporate HR, said: "It's important that even during these times of budget cuts we support, where we can, our lowest-paid workers.
"We will also work with headteachers and governing bodies to roll the living wage out to schools in the borough."
Unite Hounslow branch secretary Esther Rey said: "We welcome the move to introduce the living wage, which is considerably more than the minimum wage.
"However, we would have liked to see this taken further to include agency staff who work alongside council employees doing the same job and we would also like it to be imposed on council contractors."
Gavin Mott, joint secretary of Hounslow Unison, said: "There were originally proposals under consideration to either require or encourage contractors working for the council to adopt the living wage too. While welcoming this move, we're disappointed those proposals weren't adopted."
