Read: Purpose-led businesses stepping up to help with cost-of-living crisis
The country feels locked into a pattern of bad news at present, but even so the latest indicators on the scale of the cost of living crisis are deeply alarming. Food inflation has hit a high of 12.4 per cent, ONS figures show that 58 per cent of people in the country’s most deprived areas have already had to cut back on food and basic essentials, and many more are slipping into debt to cover the basics. Half of current Citizens Advice debt assessment clients have a negative budget that will leave them in the red after paying for essentials - that’s up from 36% in early 2021. Despite extraordinary levels of state support with the unprecedented cost of gas and electricity, millions are spending a third of their income on energy bills alone. The Trussell Trust has warned that supplies for its food banks are running low.
Members of the Purpose Coalition - a group of leading, purpose-led businesses, universities, health trusts and local authorities - understand that the impact of this appalling squeeze is all pervasive. That the cost of living crisis has triggered a cost of working crisis for many employees struggling to keep going, and a cost of learning crisis for many students in higher education. Government must focus on utilising every lever at its disposal, but our members understand that a national effort is needed across the public and private sectors. That is why we have formed a Cost Of Living Taskforce to share insights, track progress and forge new solutions based on a range of our members’ experiences from across the country.
In recent years we have seen leading businesses move from the old model of corporate social responsibility, where doing good was seen as a bolt-on to a company’s core purpose, to a more progressive approach to environment, social and governance - ESG - which recognises that any organisation is moulded by their customers, their colleagues and the communities in which they are embedded. That long-term success and resilience relies on them actively supporting those three Cs.
The global cost of living crisis is a major challenge for that progressive ESG model, and our purpose-led businesses are determined to rise to it.
There are already so many examples of companies stepping up their support. The Co-op Group, with social impact in its DNA, conducts a constant listening process to find out what support would be the most valuable and how that can be tailored best to meet colleagues’ needs and those of their communities. It’s building on its longstanding programme to support their financial wellbeing through a financial resilience programme, links with credit unions and an interest-free deposit loan scheme. It has eschewed a Christmas advertising campaign in favour of promoting the expansion of a chain of subsidised supermarkets, Your Local Pantry.
Virgin Money is redoubling its focus on tackling the poverty premium, where the least well-off in society end up paying the most. And it is investing significant resources in supporting the financial wellbeing of its staff too, with non-judgemental support for those who are struggling, a £1000 cost of living payment and a 10 per cent pay rise for most employees following a rise in profits.
Aerospace and defence company, Leonardo, also recognises the importance of supporting the financial resilience of its staff to spend and save better. And it is extending its talent pool to under-represented groups as well as those returning to work, doing more to open up the vital regional opportunities it offers to those who may previously have felt shut out.
Over Christmas and into the new year, the Cost of Living Taskforce will see our members drilling down into what is proving to be most effective and what more can be done - both from organisations themselves and from the government, which must ensure its framework of support complements and boosts what is happening in workplaces.
We all need to pull together, so if you want to be involved in this work, please get in touch.
