PRESS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 17 July 2025

MAKE (GOOD) TROUBLE C.I.C. CELEBRATES COMMITMENT TO REAL LIVING WAGE

Make (Good) Trouble C.I.C. has today accredited as a Living Wage Employer. Their Living Wage commitment will see everyone working at Make (Good) Trouble receive a minimum hourly wage of £12.60, higher than the government minimum for over 21s, which currently stands at £12.21 per hour.

Make (Good) Trouble is based in the South East, a region where over 12.9% of all jobs pay less than the real Living Wage – around 519,000 jobs. Despite this, Make (Good) Trouble has committed to pay the real Living Wage and provide a decent standard of living for all their workers.

The Living Wage Foundation’s real Living Wage remains the only UK wage rate independently 

calculated based on the cost of living, rising annually based on living costs. It gives employers 

the confidence they are paying a wage that meets everyday needs, not just the government minimum. Over 16,000 accredited employers have secured over £3.6 billion of pay rises for low paid workers since 2011 and made a profound difference to millions of lives around the UK.

Tayler Cresswell, Company Director, Make (Good) Trouble said: “As champions of young people, we’ve always believed in the importance of paying a real living wage. Everyone deserves to earn enough to live without constant struggle — and for young people especially, fair pay means the chance to be independent, secure, and truly valued. For us, accreditation is more than a badge, it’s a way to shine a light on the unfairness many young people face, and to encourage others, whether business owners or young workers, to see that fair pay should be the norm, not the exception.”

Katherine Chapman, Director, Living Wage Foundation said: “We’re delighted that Make (Good) Trouble has joined the movement of over 16,000 responsible employers across the UK who voluntarily commit to go further than the government minimum to make sure all their staff earn enough to live on.

“They join thousands of small businesses, as well as household names such as Burberry, Barclays, Everton Football Club and many more. These businesses recognise that paying the real Living Wage is the mark of a responsible employer and they, like Make (Good) Trouble, believe that everyone needs to be able to live with dignity and have a decent standard of living.”

ENDS

Media Contact

Tayler Cresswell tayler@makegoodtrouble.co.uk

NOTES TO EDITORS:

What is the real Living Wage?

The Living Wage Foundation’s real Living Wage remains the only UK wage rate independently calculated based on the cost of living, rising annually based on living costs. It gives employers the confidence they are paying a wage that meets everyday needs. The real Living Wage applies to all workers over 18 – in recognition that young people face the same living costs as everyone else. This year’s rates are £12.60 across the UK, and £13.85 in London. These figures are calculated annually by the Resolution Foundation and overseen by the Living Wage Commission, based on the best available evidence on living standards in the UK and in London. 

Over 16,000 accredited employers choose to pay the real Living Wage on a voluntary basis. The campaign for a real Living Wage has secured over £3.6bn of pay rises for low paid workers and made a profound difference to millions of lives around the UK since it began more than 20 years ago. It enjoys cross party support.

About the Living Wage Foundation

The Living Wage Foundation is the organisation at the heart of the independent movement of employers, people and communities who believe in work that works for everyone. Together we are driving up employment standards so that everyone has a decent standard of living now and in the future. Through our Living Wage, Living Hours and Living Pension accreditations, we champion and celebrate employers who make an ongoing commitment to do the right thing by their employees by providing the security and freedom they need to thrive. 

The Living Wage Foundation is part of Citizens UK; the UK’s biggest, most diverse and effective people powered alliance. Our accreditation schemes make change on the issues that matter. The Living Wage Foundation receives guidance and advice from the Living Wage Advisory Council. The Foundation is supported by our principal partners: Aviva; IKEA; Joseph Rowntree Foundation; KPMG; Linklaters; Nationwide; Nestle; Resolution Foundation; Oxfam; Trust for London; People’s Health Trust; and Queen Mary University of London.

What about the Government’s national living wage?  

In July 2015 the Chancellor of the Exchequer announced that the UK Government would introduce a compulsory ‘national living wage’ (NLW). This new government rate was a new minimum wage for staff over 25 years old. It was introduced in April 2016 and the rate is £12.21 as of April 2025. From April 2024 it applies to everyone over 21 years old.  

The rate is different to the Living Wage rates calculated by the Living Wage Foundation. The government rate is based on median earnings, while the Living Wage Foundation rates remain the only ones calculated according to the cost of living in London and the UK. A full-time worker paid the £12.60 real Living Wage will receive £760.50 in additional wages annually compared to the current Government minimum. For a full-time worker in London this figure rises to £3,198.

For more about the difference and how we calculate our rates see our website.

This is just a quick note to say a big thank you to you! Thanks to all our supporters, partners, clients and workshop participants – together we’ve created some truly inspiring artwork, films, podcasts, and mystical stories!

Just some of this year’s highlights

We’re very proud of the work that’s come out of 2024 – the young people we’ve worked with have created some fantastic creative content. 

From Series 5 of Raising Teens which was broadcast in January and February on BBC Sussex and Surrey (all episodes are available to listen to here), to our final project of 2024, developing workshops for the Future Creators programme.  

Our Holiday, Activities and Food drama club saw us back in the gorgeous South Downs National Park with Dragon Drama for a week of storytelling, den-building and… well, drama!

We spent a delightful couple of days in the summer with Wakehurst’s work experience students. Their podcasts: Orchids, Poo Sprinkles and Us and Angry Ponds and Nuclear Spreadsheets (listen below) are well worth a listen – they’ll transport you back to the summer with the sounds of nature recorded in the gardens.

Our film for the East Sussex social prescribing pilot tells the stories of children, families and professionals involved in the pilot.

Our Catalyst programme came to a close this autumn – we had an incredible 190+ young people attend workshops with some fantastic artists over the past two years. You can see their creative work in the Catalyst Gallery on our website. Below are images from the final Catalyst workshop at The Towner in Eastbourne with artists Lindsey Smith and Tom Goulden from Priority 1-54.

To close the year, we held workshops as part of the Future Creators programme. Ben and Freya’s Teen Tunes podcast is a delightful listen. In it, they talk about their musical influences, what inspires them and what they want to do in the future. 

We also worked with students from BACA who designed some brilliant graffiti boards with graffiti artist Tom Goulden. Their artwork represented the things they’re passionate about – from bringing more colour to Brighton through street art and the cost of living, to women’s rights and secure housing. They learnt how to interview each other and to make a podcast to discuss what could be done to make things better in future.  (See photo at the top of this blog post!)

So that’s it for 2024. See you next year!