Next profits boast leaves low-paid staff fuming
Thursday 13 September 2012
Printable
EmailLow-paid workers at penny-pinching clothes firm Next hit out today after it predicted bumper profits of up to £620 million this year.
The Olympics supplier boasted that profits before tax were up over 10 per cent in the first six months of the year.
And it said it would plough £200m of that into snapping up its own shares, a step which should boost their price.
But that didn't impress union GMB which has been fighting for a living wage rise in rock-bottom pay for staff across the country.
Its members took time out from the TUC Congress to picket the Brighton branch of the firm, which has advertised warehouse worker jobs for 16 and 17-year-olds as low as £4.42 an hour.
GMB regional secretary Paul Maloney said: "How can they justify paying some apprentices £2.60 per hour when they are making such huge profits?
"Directors of Next have forgotten the Henry Ford maxim that workers should be paid enough to enable them to buy the goods they handle."
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