Chefs ‘paid less than minimum wage by Roux Jr’
SERVING gourmet starters at £60 a pop, you might expect the chefs to be well remunerated.
But, it seems, not a lot of that money is going to the staff at Michel Roux Jr’s Michelin-starred restaurant, with some claiming they are being paid less than the minimum wage.
Some workers at Le Gavroche in Mayfair say they have routinely worked 14-hour shifts for the equivalent of £5.50 an hour – well below the national minimum of £ .20. They claim they would work up to 68 hours a week but earn only about £3 5 before tax.
It means some chefs at the restaurant, which has just been voted London’s top gastronomic experience, are being paid less than if they were to work at a fast-food outlet.
‘Other restaurants pay their staff at least minimum wage, even if it is a struggle for them to do so,’ one chef, who did not wish to be identified, told the Guardian.
‘If any restaurant can afford to pay their staff the legal minimum, it is Le Gavroche.’ He said shifts often began as early as am and did not end until 11.30pm, with only an hour’s break in between.
Opened by Michel Roux Snr in Chelsea in 196 , the restaurant became the first in the country to win three Michelin stars. It lost its third star in 1993 but still has a waiting list of up to three months and, with a tasting menu costing £215, including wine, it has earned a formidable reputation on the London culinary circuit.
But Le Gavroche could now face an HMRC investigation into underpayment of the minimum wage, despite reporting almost £250,000 profits last year.
Roux Jr, who also made a name for himself as a no-nonsense judge on MasterChef: The Professionals, vowed to reduce the number of hours his employees work by cutting back the restaurant’s opening hours.
A spokesman for Le Gavroche said: ‘This will reduce the maximum estimated working hours to 50 hours a week. All salaries will be maintained at the current level despite less hours worked.’