Mitie employ 600 staff working in Lloyds Banking Group corporate buildings across England, Scotland and Wales. The talks on April 29th will cover paying a living wage for staff on Lloyd Bank sites in Gloucester, Cardiff, Birmingham, Newport, Swansea, Leeds, Sheffield, Halifax, Chester, Warrington, Manchester, Edinburgh and Glasgow.

Jude Brimble, GMB National Officer, said “Meetings have been stalled for several months. The talks have come to a standstill because of the bank’s refusal to commit to providing the funds to ensure these staff are paid a living wage. It is astounding that Lloyds Banking Group is refusing to stump up the money to pay decent wages to these workers. Earlier this year Lloyds announced that they would resume paying dividends to its shareholders, and that they have made £1.8bn in profit in 2014. It seems that they don’t want their hard-working facilities staff to share in this good fortune.

Security, reception and postroom staff work on Lloyds sites alongside directly employed staff but are employed by Mitie. Lloyds are using a loophole to claim they are a living wage employer but fail to ensure that their outsourced workers are paid a living wage of £7.85 outside London, let alone the £10 an hour that GMB believe is the minimum to have a decent life. It is simply not acceptable that Lloyds Bank is deliberately handing out contracts that mean low wages and pay freezes for outsourced staff.

GMB is calling on Lloyds to face up the their responsibilities and commit to ensuring that all workers performing functions for the bank, regardless of employer, are given decent wages and rises reflecting the cost of living. GMB members will expect progress in the talks on April 29th. We will step up the campaign if that does not happen.