Wates has furloughed a quarter of its workforce – totalling around 1,000 people – in response to the coronavirus crisis.
Chief executive David Allen said that the firm had to make “tough short-term decisions” to ensure the future success of the group.
The workers will be furloughed from Monday 6 April in line with government guidance and is expected to last three months. Meanwhile the group board will be taking a 35% reduction in pay. Only Wates employees on the lowest salaries and those continuing to work on live sites and projects will be exempt from any reductions.
Allen said: “We are a strong business that has overcome many challenges during our 123-year history, and we will come through the unprecedented challenges created by covid-19. Our financial results for 2019 were excellent. We arrived at the start of this global crisis in a position of financial strength and will emerge from it ready and able to thrive once again because we are making hard choices now.
“We recognise the additional pressures currently being faced by the majority of our colleagues who simply cannot work from home and who continue to be based on our sites and projects. Their pay and the pay of our most junior staff will not be adjusted. Everyone else, from the group board down, will be and it is right that the most senior members of the team will make the biggest contributions. We are all in this together.
“No one can foresee how long this crisis will continue, and other adjustments may need to be made, but we are determined to get through it, to emerge stronger, and for our people to keep their jobs.”
