‘You will not face this alone’, Rishi Sunak tells UK workers; unveils wage boost package

To all Britishers anxious about days ahe, UK’s Indian-origin finance minister Rishi Sunak said: “you will t face this alone”, as he unveiled an “unprecedented” multi-billion pound pack aimed at protecting people’s jobs through coronavirus pandemic which is crippling global ecomy.

Chancellor of Exchequer once again took centre-st in UK’s COVID-19 fightback and struck a te of compassion as he joined British Prime Minister Boris Johnson at Downing Street on Friday evening to anunce that government would step in to cover 80 per cent of ws of those unable to work, so that companies do t have to resort to redundancies.

“w, more than any time in our recent history, we will be judged by our capacity for compassion. Our ability to come through this won’t just be down to what government or business can do, but by individual acts of kindness we show one ar,” said Sunak, son-in-law of Infosys co-founder Narayana Murthy, who has become face of UK’s ecomic fightback during outbreak which has claimed 177 lives in country.

“To all those at home right w, anxious about days ahe, I say this: you will t face this alone,” he said.

“For first time in our history, government is going to step in and help to pay people’s ws. We’re setting up a new Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme,” he said, just days after he unveiled a massive 350-billion pound rescue pack for Britain's struggling businesses.

As part of Sunak’s “unprecedented measures, for unprecedented times”, any employer in UK – small or large, charitable or n-profit – will be eligible for scheme.

y will be able to contact tax department, HMRC, for a grant to cover most of ws of people who are t working but are furloughed and kept on payroll, rar than being laid off.

And under scheme, government grants will cover 80 per cent of salary of retained workers up to a total of 2,500 pounds a month, which is above UK’s median income.

“And, of course, employers can top up salaries furr if y choose to. That means workers in any part of UK can retain ir job, even if ir employer cant afford to pay m, and be paid at least 80 per cent of ir salary,” explained Sunak.

job retention scheme will cover cost of ws backdated to March 1 and will be open initially for at least three months, to be extended scheme for longer if required. Crucially, minister said he was t placing any limit on amount of funding available for scheme.

“We will pay grants to support as many jobs as necessary. We said we would stand toger with British people – and we meant it,” he said.

39-year-old, who h presented his very first Budget just earlier this month, has h to come back with two ditional mini-budgets just days apart as he unleashed a string of or measures, including VAT and tax waivers and easier access to credit.

He also anunced that Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme will be interest free for 12 months, up from an initial timeline set for six months.

He concluded his latest set of ecomic boosters with a direct plea for greater kindness and support, amid ongoing reports of panic buying and supermarket shelves stripped and depriving frontline medical staff battling disease being left without essentials at end of ir long hospital shifts.

“When this is over, and it will be over, we want to look back at this moment and remember many small acts of kindness done by us and to us,” Sunak said.

“We want to look back on this time and remember how, in face of a generation-defining moment, we undertook a collective national effort – and we stood toger,” he said.

coronavirus death toll has gone up to 11,397 with more than 275,427 cases reported in over 160 countries and territories, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. PTI AK MRJ MRJ