Buckingham Group staff to receive full pay at the end of June

Construction organisation Buckingham Group is to return 130 employees to full pay from 1 July 2020.

Since April 2020, 130 out of its 620 employees have been asked to take a mandatory pay cut. Office-based staff saw a reduction of salary ranging from 6% to 17.5%, senior managers a decrease of 20% and directors a pay reduction of 50% .

Alongside the pay decreases, the organisation has also been relying on the Government’s Job Retention Scheme (GJRS) and has furloughed 65 employees since the scheme started. However, 15 employees have now returned to work, leaving 50 employees still on furlough.

Mike Kempley, chief executive at Buckingham Group, said: "The three-month cut, which could have been extended, was initially introduced because the scale of the Coronavirus hit was unknown.

“Half of our furloughed employees are workers on the tools and half are white-collar staff. And out of that, about half of each group is to do with a vulnerable house member, or they are vulnerable themselves. If it wasn’t for Covid-19 (Coronavirus) they’d be at work.”