Shop owners in Cardiff are worried that the recent rise in minimum wage will negatively impact their profits, whilst workers are saying the increase is not enough. This comes after a countrywide rise in wages came into effect on April the first, affecting more than 3 million workers in the UK.
The National Minimum Wage for adults has risen from £11.44 per hour to £12.21. The wage for workers aged 18-20 years old will go up from £8.60 per hour to £10 per hour.
Shahbaz Hussain runs a small business in Cardiff city centre selling sports equipment. He says he’s been hit hard by the increases.
The wage increase at the moment is critical for small businesses. We have to do more work and cut some of my staff’s hours to keep going.
At the same time the cost of energy, water bills, council tax and phone bills has gone up. The energy bills rose up by 6.4% in Wales, the price of a unit of gas is going up from 6.34p KWH to 6.99p KWH. The price of electricity has also gone up – with an unit rising from 24.86p/kwh to 27.3p/kwh. The Water bill has also risen an average of 26%. On top of this, council tax and broadband bills are going up by 6.4% and 5% respectively.
Maja Mikolajczyk is a worker at vape shop in Cardiff City Centre. She was very emotional while talking about the current situation and says the wage increase is not enough considering all of the increasing bills.
Me and my family have to be careful about our spending habits. Such as, saving up on heating to not pay so much electricity every month. That means possibly being in a colder and more humid environment.
The UK government says increasing the minimum wage will give hard working people a pay rise twice the rate of inflation. The Government hopes the minimum wage increase will mean more spending on the High Street.