A film to mark Living Wage Week
Campaigning and celebrating
The real Living Wage is the only wage rate based on the actual cost of living. It exists to ensure workers receive the Minimum Income Standard, and to protect them against in-work poverty. During Living Wage Week every November, Citizens UK and The Living Wage Foundation take time to thank the 16,000 UK employers who voluntarily pay the Living Wage; to celebrate the workers who benefit from it; and to reflect upon the achievements of this ever-growing campaign for economic justice.
The movement, whose first instigators and supporters included East London churches, continues to have particular significance in the capital. This is firstly due to the continued need for a real Living Wage, to protect workers from in-work poverty in the UK’s most expensive city, and secondly, due to the continued passion with which London businesses, educational institutions, trade unions, community and faith groups pursue the campaign.
The London Diocese includes a number of churches who actively campaign on the Living Wage; still more who are accredited Living Wage employers; and even more who pay the Living Wage though have not yet accredited. This year, to mark Living Wage Week, accredited churches came together to collaborate on a film, to express what the real Living Wage means to them and why it matters to their communities.
A Compassionate Communities road trip…
Across five separate filming days in September and October, the LDF’s Compassionate Communities team filmed 20 speakers across 12 locations. As well as setting up camp at London Diocesan House, we ventured to Two Cities, Stepney, and Kensington to fit filming sessions into busy clergy diaries. We filmed with St Paul’s Cathedral, who employ some 220 staff, on the same day as small, parish churches, whose Living Wage commitment is to just a couple staff members. Each voice we captured represented another institution supporting a growing movement for justice.
At many London churches, fighting for justice goes hand in hand with showing mercy, and it was a tremendous encouragement, not only to come together to promote the Living Wage campaign, but also to catch a glimpse of other busy Compassion ministries underway across the diocese. At Holy Sepulchre London, filming was snatched in moments of quiet between songs, at a dementia friendly concert. At St Botolph-without-Bishopsgate, we set up the camera between boxes of tea and supplies for the church’s winter homelessness ministry. And at St Jude and St Paul’s Mildmay, filming overlapped with a community meal and book bank visit.
Heartfelt thanks and an invitation
We are sincerely grateful to all the churches who took part in the video, to all the diocesan churches who pay the real Living Wage, and to those churches who support the campaign (even where they do not employ their own staff).
It is our hope that, where churches have not yet thought about paying the real Living Wage, or have not yet accredited, they will carefully consider whether they might be part of this movement for justice – through prayer, activism, or accreditation.
With special thanks to: Holy Sepulchre London, the Independent Workers of Great Britain (Cleaners Branch), St Botolph-without-Bishopsgate, St Gabriel’s Cricklewood, St George-in-the-East, St James’s Picadilly, St John’s Hoxton, St Jude & St Paul’s Mildmay, the Guild Church of St Katharine Kree, St Mary Islington, St Mary’s Preschool, St Marylebone Parish Church, St Paul’s Cathedral, St Paul’s Hammersmith, St Stephen’s Canonbury, and the Bishop of London.
Join the movement
If your church is interested in accrediting, do read through our Living Wage toolkit (linked below), and fill in an accreditation form online.
Supporters of the real Living Wage (and those who would like to learn more about it) are warmly invited to the “Ecumenical Call to Prayer and Action for the Living Wage 2025 (with London Citizens).” This takes place on Wednesday 12 November, between 7pm and 8.30pm at the Guild Church of St Katharine Cree (EC3A 3BP). Sign up below.
Find out more:
- Learn more about the Real Living Wage
- Read the Compassionate Communities Living Wage toolkit