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A record 22,400 workers on the minimum wage will get millions in back pay after their employers cheated them out of wages.

Odeon cinemas, Home Bargains and Card Factory are included among the businesses named and shamed today.

The government has ‘named and shamed’ 239 employers found to have underpaid workers by a total of £1.44m and fimned the firms a record total of £1.97m.

The earliest underpayment dated back to 2011, with the most recent happening this year with the most common reasons include;being unlawful deductions, such as for uniforms, underpaying apprentices and failing to pay travel time.

Business Minister Andrew Griffiths said: “Our priority is making sure workers know their rights and are getting the pay they worked hard for. Employers who don’t do the right thing face fines as well as being hit with the bill for backpay.

“The UK’s lowest paid workers have had the fastest wage growth in 20 years thanks to the introduction of the National Living Wage (£7.83 an hour) and today’s list serves as a reminder to all employers to check they are getting their workers’ pay right.”

(Image: South Wales Evening Post)

Frances O’Grady, TUC general secretary, said:”Minimum wage underpayment is happening on an industrial scale. “Any worker who has been cheated deserves compensation. And their employers should be named and shamed.

“These record-breaking figures show that investing in enforcement works. But we know that tens of thousands more workers are still being underpaid, so government must keep the pressure on.”

The worst offenders included Sportswift Limited, trading as Card Factory, of Wakefield, West Yorkshire, which failed to pay £430,097.87 to 10,256 workers, with average arrears of £41.94 per worker.

T.J. Morris Limited, trading as Home Bargains, of Liverpool, which failed to pay £272,228.44 to 6,743 workers, with average arrears of £40.37 per worker

John Stanley’s Care Agency Limited, of Tendring, Essex, failed to pay £60,056.80 to 91 workers, with average arrears of £659.96 per worker and Fosse Healthcare Limited, of Leicester, failed to pay £50,170.06 to 185 workers, with average arrears of £271.19 per worker.

(Image: Huddersfield Examiner)

The ‘name and shame’ scheme is in its fifth year and calls out employers who have fallen foul of minimum wage laws, so far identifying £10.8m in back pay for around 90,000 workers, with more than 1,900 employers fined a total of £8.4m.

Employers who pay workers less than the minimum wage have to pay back arrears of wages to the worker at current minimum wage rates and face financial penalties of up to 200% of arrears, capped at £20,000 per worker.

Low Pay Commission Chairman Bryan Sanderson said:“It is crucial that employers understand their responsibilities and workers know their rights around the minimum wage. That is why active enforcement and effective communication from Government is so important.

“It is therefore encouraging to see that HMRC has recovered unpaid wages for the largest number of workers yet in this round of naming and shaming. I’m confident that the Government will continue to pursue underpayment of the minimum wage vigorously.”

A study by Young Women’s Trust, estimates up to a million workers under the age of 25 are losing as much as £3,513 a year because they are not entitled to the National Living Wage.

The charity said last year a million jobs held by those under the age of 25 were paid less than the £7.83 National Living Wage.

Here is the full list of companies released today by the Government