Employees missed out on £2bn of holiday pay last year, according to research by the TUC.
It found that 1.1 million employees did not get a single day of the 28 days’ holiday entitlement they were entitled to last year.
Black and ethnic minority workers were hardest hit, with 6% of these workers not getting any paid holiday last year, compared to 4% of white employees.
Low-paid workers were most at risk of not getting their paid holiday entitlement. The TUC’s analysis revealed that the jobs with the highest numbers of staff losing out were waiters and waitresses (59,000), care workers and home carers (55,000), and kitchen and catering assistants (50,000).
The TUC calculated lost holiday by using the average hourly pay and usual weekly hours for those who received no paid holiday. The average loss per worker last year was £1,800.
Workers’ rights
Slightly more women than men lost out on their paid holiday entitlement, with 554,000 female workers compared to 547,000 male workers losing some holiday.
The TUC said the main reasons people were losing out on holiday were being set unrealistic workloads that do not allow time to take leave; workplace cultures where workers fear taking time off will mean they are treated unfavourably; employers deliberately denying holiday requests and managers failing to keep up with the law.
The union body, which began its annual conference yesterday, said workers being “cheated” out of holiday pay was one of the areas the government should address in its new Employment Rights Bill.
One of the key elements of the bill is the creation of a Fair Work Agency, which would have the power to crack down on bad employment practices such as failing to pay the minimum wage or not allowing employees to take their holiday entitlement.
Shortly after the election, a survey found that six in 10 voters supported the introduction of a single enforcement body to tackle poor employment practices.
TUC general secretary Paul Nowak said: “We all deserve a break from work to spend time off with our friends and family. But more than a million working people have been deprived of any of the paid leave they are due. And hundreds of thousands more have been denied basic rights like being paid the minimum wage.
“The Conservative government sat back and let bad employers cheat their staff out of their basic workplace rights. Tory ministers were more concerned about stopping people getting what they were due by introducing anti-union measures, than funding enforcement bodies properly.”
“This week at Congress we will be debating how we can drive up standards at work. These shocking findings show why we need the Employment Rights Bill and the Fair Work Agency. Working people deserve to be treated fairly and have a minimum floor of rights upheld.”
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