On the day that internship schemes for recent graduates begin across the UK, the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) has called for the introduction of a £2.50 an hour ‘training wage’.

According to CIPD research, 37% of internships are unpaid. The Internships: To Pay or not To Pay? paper proposes that all interns should be paid a guaranteed minimum wage.

The paper suggests that this new ‘training wage’ would reflect the contribution an intern makes to an organisation, as well as promote social mobility by encouraging people from poorer backgrounds to apply.

The proposed £2.50 an hour wage – the current minimum pay for apprentices – would cover all interns and apprentices regardless of their occupation or industry sector.  Any position advertised as an internship would automatically trigger a legal obligation on the employer to pay at least the training wage throughout the entire placement.

Tom Richmond, skills adviser at the CIPD, commented: ‘The continued existence of a major loophole in the national minimum wage legislation has created a lot of confusion and concern around the issue of whether interns should be paid or not.  We believe that the introduction of this training wage would reflect the contribution that interns make to their organisations.’