'It's not right' | John Lewis refuses to join rivals in cutting sick pay for unjabbed staff

John Lewis has vowed to continue paying all staff full sick-pay for COVID-related absences, regardless of whether they’ve been vaccinated, the BBC has reported.

The retail giant’s Operations Director, Andrew Murphy, confirmed in LinkedIn post that the firm had no plans to follow industry rivals in cutting sick pay based on vaccination status, stating “we don’t believe it’s right” to do so.

The announcement comes after companies such as Ocado, Next, Morrisons and IKEA revealed they are now only paying the legal minimum to staff who have had only one or no jabs, should they have to isolate due to Covid-19 exposure.

In a LinkedIn post, Murphy wrote: ”We’re conscious that some businesses have changed their sick pay policy with regard to unvaccinated employees in some Covid related absence scenarios.
At the John Lewis Partnership we’re not going to make any change of this type.