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Law firm announces first 1000 equal pay claims against Tesco

Leigh Day has announced that it has now lodged the first 1000 equal pay claims against Tesco on behalf of female members of staff in potentially the largest ever equal pay challenge in UK history.

Posted on 11 July 2018

The legal action has been estimated as potentially costing the supermarket giant £4bn in compensation to workers.

According to the law firm they have received thousands more enquiries and expect the number of claims from Tesco staff, over the disparity in pay between store staff and those in the predominantly male dominated distribution centres, to continue to rise.

Following the announcement in February 2018 that the firm was taking this legal action, lawyers in the employment team at Leigh Day have hosted meetings across the country and created a specialist unit to handle calls from women and men who work in the stores and are paid considerably less than their colleagues in the distribution centres.

Paula Lee one of the lawyers handling the Tesco claims at Leigh Day, said: “We’ve had an incredible response to the announcement of this legal action. Many proud members of staff have realised that this claim is not anti-Tesco, but it is to ensure that the work done in stores and distribution centres is recognised as being of equal value; not the same work, but work of equal value and that they should be paid the same as their colleagues in distribution.

“Both store staff and distribution staff play an essential role in making billions of pounds for Tesco executives and shareholders, they should both be paid equally for what they contribute to the business.

“The concept of ‘women’s work’ is an outdated approach to employment from the middle of the last century which needs to be corrected.”

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Research by Leigh Day has found that people working in the predominantly male dominated Tesco distribution centres may earn in excess of £11.00 an hour whilst the most common grade for store staff sees them receive around £8.00 per hour.

This means a full-time distribution worker completing the same number of hours, earns over £100 a week or £5,000 a year more than female-based store staff.

The underpayment of workers could apply to over 250,000 Tesco employees, with estimated pay shortfalls that could reach £20,000. The final bill for Tesco could be as high as £4bn.

Alongside the claim against Tesco, Leigh Day is currently representing over 20,000 shop-floor workers in equal pay claims against fellow supermarket giants Sainsbury's and ASDA, which both face similar claims of discrepancies in pay between the male dominated distribution centres and the mainly female staffed stores.

Paula Lee continued:

"According to the latest Annual Report from Tesco the remuneration package for the Chief Executive Officer and the Chief Financial Officer totalled £6.3m, yet figures show that Tesco employees are having to claim millions of pounds in working tax credits, paying people fairly benefits the whole of society.”