The uplift, which showcases Cygnet’s ongoing commitment to invest in its staff, means the minimum rate is now £12 per hour for all permanent staff outside of London and £13.15 per hour for all permanent London staff.
This equates to an annual salary of £23,400 based on 37.5 hours a week and £25,300 for London employees.
Across 150 services in England, Wales and Scotland, 11,500 Cygnet staff care for approximately 7,500 individuals each year.
This RLW increase will benefit three-quarters (75%) of the Cygnet Health Care and Cygnet Social Care workforce and applies to all relevant staff, regardless of role, including Healthcare Assistants, ancillary staff, support workers and members of the maintenance team.
In a further demonstration of staff investment, Cygnet has implemented an average increase of 9.8% for non-qualified employees and an average pay increase of 15% for Chefs/Head Chefs.
The company has also made a significant investment in Social Worker pay and a further investment in assistant psychologist and psychologist pay.
All other Cygnet permanent employees received an average wage increase of ~5%.
Jenny Gibson, Director of HR at Cygnet, said: “We are delighted to announce these well-deserved pay increases for our workforce.
“Recognising and rewarding staff is essential – our people are everything. The hard-work, dedication and compassion of our staff enable us to improve lives together. The quality care we provide across our services empowers our residents and service users to live the lives they deserve.
“Staff’s passion, commitment to excellence, and unwavering dedication to our service users deserves to be rewarded.”
In 2023 Cygnet recruited 4,400 new staff, saw vacancies reduce by 46%, staff turnover reduce by 20% and agency staff usage reduce from 18% to 9%.
Jenny added: “We are also continuing to invest in the learning and development of our staff. Our Apprenticeships offer a great opportunity to build on knowledge, skills, and behaviours, while earning a recognised qualification.
“We offer dynamic and role-specific pathways through our own bespoke apprenticeship programmes and we support our staff every step of the way.”
Cygnet currently offer Apprenticeships in: Nursing, Support Work, Occupational Therapy, Assistant Practitioner, Leadership and Management, Deputy Management (Social Care), Support Services and, Digital and Data Services.
Cygnet’s Nursing Pathway Apprentice Programme is helping to address an industry-wide shortage of nurses, as recruitment and retention of staff remains a key concern for the sector. Over 1,000 staff have taken advantage of its Apprenticeship pathways in the last 5 years.
The company currently has 238 live apprentices on programme in a range of apprenticeship specialities and 459 have completed different programmes since the levy was implemented in various specialisms.
Throughout 2024 Cygnet is opening five new state-of-the art hospitals and completely modernising many existing facilities as part of an extensive investment programme.
By 2025, the company will have in excess of 200 services across the UK, which will make it one of the largest and best leading providers of behavioural health services in the country.