MINISTERS must learn lessons from the pandemic and finally fix Britain’s “broken sick leave system,” TUC and business leaders will urge in a joint call today. 

Millions of low-paid workers have been faced with the “impossible choice” of self-isolating or putting food on the table during the Covid-19 crisis due to poor sick pay, TUC general secretary Frances O’Grady said. 

The TUC and Federation of Small Businesses have written to Chancellor Rishi Sunak, urging him to take a fresh look at the issue of sick pay to protect workers’ health and to ensure small businesses can afford it. 

Two years on from the outbreak, it’s time ministers “stopped turning a blind eye to the obvious problem” and created an “effective sick leave system,” Ms O’Grady stressed.   

“Delivering sick pay for all would be an important first step, but with statutory sick pay at a measly £96 a week, we need ministers to increase it to real living wage so people can afford to self-isolate,” she said.

An estimated two million people, mainly women, are also shut out of receiving any sick pay at all because they earn below the eligibility threshold. 

Martin McTague of the federation urged the government not to scrap the statutory sick pay rebate to small firms, due to end in March, warning that with the tightening cost-of-living squeeze there could not be a worse time to remove the support. 

“Small business owners are struggling to find £5 billion a year for sick pay costs,” he said. 

“The government should do the right thing and make the small employer rebate a permanent feature of how we manage workplace sickness, and protect small firms which help those with health challenges into work.”

Labour warned against moves to weaken statutory sick pay, which is already one of the least generous schemes among European nations. 

Shadow work and pensions secretary Jonathan Ashworth said: “Weakening statutory sick pay now would prove once again that Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak are not on the side of working people.”

More than 50 MPs and peers urged Mr Sunak to urgently increase statutory sick pay in December to encourage workers who test positive for Covid-19 to self-isolate.