SOME of Oxford’s major employers will only pay workers a Living Wage if they are ‘embarrassed’ into doing so, according to a trade union official.

Regional officer for the Unite union Fred Hanna said Oxford City Council’s Living Wage campaign to get low paid workers a minimum salary of £9.26 an hour could be uncomfortable for some companies.

He made the comments at a meeting of the council’s Living Wage group, which is investigating how more employers can be encouraged to pay that rate.

For some workers, being paid the Oxford Living Wage could mean an pay increase of £1.76 an hour.

Mr Hanna said: “How do you encourage them to put another couple of pounds an hour into the pay packet of somebody who’s employed in their company that feeds their people, who live in Oxford to pay more?

“In my experience having been with [major Oxford employers] for the last 10 years, is that you embarrass them. There’s no other way. You embarrass them into having to do it. That’s the way it works. It’s not the most comfortable way of doing it, that’s the only way you will do it.”

He said some of the lowest paid workers in Oxford included staff working in companies which had been sub-contracted by major firms to deliver cleaning and catering services.

Some of those staff over 25-years-old are paid the government’s mandatory National Living Wage of £7.50 an hour, while Mr Hanna claimed some of their managers are paid just 10p more an hour.

Mr Hanna has represented staff working at BMW's Cowley plant for a decade.

He said: “I’ve heard their hard luck stories. A good starting point is with employers who employ third party contractors is: 'can you afford to pay somebody a decent Living Wage?' With BMW, they can afford it. They make billions of pounds worth of profit. I’ve been out on their events and I know what sort of money is spent.”

Oxford City Council currently do not know how many employers pay the Oxford Living Wage.

But the authority said it requires any firms on contracts worth more than £100,000 to pay the £9.26 an hour wage.

It wants employers to join the voluntary scheme to ensure employees and their families 'can live free from poverty’.

Employers can also choose to join another voluntary scheme, led by the Living Wage Foundation. That rate is set at £8.45 an hour.

A BMW spokesman said: "BMW (UK) Manufacturing offers competitive salary and benefits packages to its employees. The wages that are set and paid by external contractors to their staff are a matter for those individual businesses. Any contractor carrying out services for us must comply with all relevant national pay and employment legislation."