The report describes rising living costs and stagnating wages having created a ‘double squeeze’ on low-paid workers. It says this will not be relieved by the economic recovery and taxpayers will pick up the bill. The report’s other findings include:

- Real average wages have grown by only 13 per cent since 1999, whereas economic output has risen by four times this rate

 - Housing costs have tripled in the past 15 years (this is one and a half times the amount by which wages have risen)

 - Electricity, water and gas bills have risen by 88 per cent in the last five years

The report found that 5.24 million workers in Britain (21 per cent of the workforce) are paid below a Living Wage – an increase of 420,000, or nine per cent over the last 12 months.

Despite the government’s emphasis that poverty is caused by welfare dependency, the report claims that 6.7 million of the 13 million people in poverty in the UK are in a family where someone works. This is the first time, that working households have represented more than half the total of those in poverty. Read more at Ekklesia 

The Living Wage Commission will release its final report in June 2014. The interim report is available to view here: Working for Poverty