Reform UK’s plan for a ‘Women and Motherhood Protection Act’ has been described by trade unions as a “shameless and deceptive” attempt to distract from policies which slash women’s rights.
Reform said the new Act would bring together “key protections currently scattered across different laws”, including equal pay, sex discrimination, employment rights, unfair dismissal and maternity leave.
The party said that by consolidating these in one clear legal framework, it will give women, mothers and families stronger protections under the law.
Reform equality spokeswoman Suella Braverman said: “As the first cabinet minister in British history to take maternity leave, and as a working mother of two children, I understand the challenges women face when balancing a career and family life. No woman should ever feel that becoming a mother will hold her back or leave her with fewer opportunities.”
Reform, which in February said it would repeal the Equality Act, said it would increase the time limit for pregnancy and maternity discrimination tribunal claims from three months to 12 months, giving new mothers more time to challenge unfair treatment at work.
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The party claimed that “new mothers should be focused on their child, not paperwork and no woman should lose her legal rights because she spent the first months of motherhood being a mum”.
Reform said it would also preserve equal pay, maintain protections against sex discrimination, strengthen safeguards against dismissal during pregnancy and maternity leave, and enhance redundancy protections for new mothers.
The Women and Motherhood Act would also extend existing maternity protections by introducing explicit rights for breastfeeding mothers, protections for women undergoing fertility treatment, and new leave rights for parents who suffer miscarriage or stillbirth.
Braverman said: “A Reform UK government will be the most pro-woman, pro-mother and pro-family government in British history.”
But, the TUC described Reform’s proposals as “shameless” attempt to distract from the party’s “sexist” policies and candidates. It said that most of the protections Reform has promised to deliver are either already in place or will be soon.
It highlighted that Reform is promising to keep some protections from sex discrimination, which have been in place for half a century, while scrapping the Equality Act and most of the Employment Rights Act. Expecting women to be grateful for these reductions in their rights is “galling”, said the trade union body.
TUC general secretary Paul Nowak said: “Let’s call this out for what it is – a smokescreen for slashing women’s rights and making life harder for families. It’s shameless and deceptive.
“If Reform was really on the side of women, the party wouldn’t have pledged to rip up the Equality Act, effectively legalising discrimination.
“They wouldn’t have vowed to repeal new rights being introduced by the Employment Rights Act, like protection from harassment. And they wouldn’t have shrugged off blatant misogyny from their own candidate as just laddish banter.
“Equating women’s success with motherhood is patronising, antiquated and plain wrong. All women – whether mums or not – are at risk from a Reform government that wants to turn the clock back. The party can never be trusted on women’s rights.”
Labour MP Stella Creasy, who has campaigned against the “motherhood penalty”, the detriment women face to their careers when having children, went further.
She told HuffPost UK: “Reform reveal they think only women have responsibility for bringing up children.
“This is a charter for bringing in the Handmaid’s Tale, not equality in the home or the workplace – reinforcing the motherhood penalty and not ending it.”
She added: “That’s why we need to align with Europe in giving all parents rights to paid parental leave so that no parent is left holding the baby.
“If Reform are serious about helping end discrimination, they should back my amendment to do that instead of failing to even mention the responsibilities of dads and second parents.”
Commenting on Reform’s specific proposals, Nowak added: “Reform has serious questions to answer on whether they will keep the principle of equal pay for equal value work.
“It is galling and offensive to ask women to be grateful for commitments to keep protections that have been around for half a century, while scrapping two huge pieces of legislation which enshrine recent hard-won rights.”
Bridget Phillipson, the women and equalities minister, said: “Tearing up the Equality Act on day one just to replace it with something weaker is a complete waste of time and money. It was a Labour government that put women’s rights into law, and a Labour government now that is safeguarding and strengthening them.”
The shadow equalities minister Claire Coutinho criticised the plans also. She said: “Reform care so little about women’s rights, they said they’d scrap the Equality Act without even realising that it protects pregnant women from being sacked.”
On Monday, Reform’s Robert Jenrick announced plans to cut employers’ national insurance contributions, but only for British workers. The tax cut would be funded by a new “employers’ migrant labour levy“, which could cost £3,750 for each foreign worker on the national living wage.
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The University of Dundee has announced plans to cut 190 jobs in a bid to address its financial deficit.
The university has already cut around 675 jobs through voluntary redundancies, but still needs to make savings of around £20 million.
In November 2024, it told staff that job losses were “inevitable” due to a £30 million deficit for the next financial year.
Last year, members of the University and College Union (UCU) staged 28 days of strike action, and earlier this month voted by 79% in favour of more walkouts and 89% in favour of industrial action short of a strike.
This week, staff were read a statement detailing the further job cuts but were not invited to ask questions, according to a member of staff interviewed by BBC Scotland.
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“Whole units are being put into so-called voluntary redundancy where everybody in that unit is now going to lose their job,” he said. “So there’s nothing voluntary about it; this is compulsory redundancy.”
Interim principal and vice-chancellor Professor Nigel Seaton said the university had taken “vigorous action” to address the financial situation, but “there is a limit to how much further we can go, so the greater part of the additional savings will have to come from staff costs”.
The university will now hold a period of collective consultation with staff and unions.
Ian Ellis, Dundee UCU branch co-president, said: “This is devastating news for staff at the University of Dundee and anyone who cares about the university, its future and students at Dundee.
“Staff are once again paying the price for management failings and a catalogue of managerial missteps.
“Every job that is lost, whether by voluntary redundancy or by possible compulsory redundancies, is a tragedy for the individuals impacted but also diminishes the university and leaves increasingly unmanageable workloads for the staff who remain.”
Jo Grady, UCU general secretary, added: “Only last week, UCU members at Dundee returned an overwhelming ballot result to defend jobs and ensure a future for the university.
“It is for members to decide the next step in this dispute, but I know their resolve is undiminished since the crisis was first announced in Autumn 2024.
“Management should be clear that we will, as we have always done, continue to defend every job that we can both individually and collectively.”
Dundee is the latest in a series of universities to announce plans to make job cuts or to be impacted by industrial action against restructuring plans.
Aberdeen University announced it was consulting over 100 proposed redundancies in May, and staff at Glasgow Caledonian University held three days of strike action earlier this month in a dispute over up to 100 potential compulsory redundancies.
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When someone is underperforming at work, managers often rush to brand it as a capability problem and address it as such. Instead, workplaces should foster the conditions where workers have the capacity to cope, says Claire Libby.
Mental ill health costs UK employers billions every year. Yet despite growing awareness of workplace wellbeing, many organisations are still responding to problems far later than they need to.
One of the reasons for this may be that we are looking for performance problems when we should be looking more closely at the conditions that produce performance in the first place.
I have shared the sometimes-unpopular opinion that I don’t believe there is such a thing as work-life balance, for the simple reason that we spend a disproportionate amount of our lives at work.
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Whatever we have going on in our personal lives ripples into our work lives and vice versa. I am also not a fan of the word “wellbeing”.
For me it doesn’t pack the punch it needs to because the consequences of poor wellbeing are life changing. The term wellbeing feels a bit fluffy and optional rather than optimal.
Yet in many organisations, performance and wellbeing are still treated as separate conversations.
False assumptionsWhen performance begins to decline, the assumption is often straightforward: additional training, development, support, or performance management may be needed. But increasingly, research suggests the picture is more complex.
Most of us have experienced periods where we are technically capable of doing something, yet for a variety of reasons we no longer have the internal capacity to sustain it.
We find it harder to concentrate. Our decision-making becomes more difficult and tasks that were once manageable begin to feel overwhelming. We don’t have the patience we once did and we can’t pinpoint the reason why. We start to become less resilient to everyday pressures.
The challenge is that these experiences are often interpreted as capability problems when they may be the early warning signs of reduced capacity.
What we don’t seeOne of the things I notice most in organisations is how often stress goes unnoticed until it has already become embedded in everyday functioning.
Think about the image of a swan on a lake. On the surface, the swan appears calm and composed, yet beneath the water its legs are working furiously to stay afloat.
For many employees, this is exactly what is happening. Everything appears fine from the outside. Targets are still being met. Meetings are still being attended. Responsibilities are still being fulfilled.
Yet beneath the surface, sleep may be suffering, stress may be accumulating, recovery may be limited, and emotional reserves may be gradually becoming depleted. People start to become a more diluted version of their brilliant selves.
The thing about stress is that it rarely announces itself dramatically. More often, it builds quietly over weeks, months, and sometimes years before becoming visible.
By the time organisations notice it, the underlying causes have often been present for far longer than anyone realised.
At this point it can become so much harder to support the employee. That sense of overwhelm has gathered momentum.
Creating the conditionsOne of the emerging themes in my research is that performance may be better understood as a state shaped by multiple wellbeing systems rather than a fixed measure of ability.
Sleep, recovery, stress regulation, nutrition, movement, social connection and psychological safety all influence how people think, feel, communicate and perform.
These are not simply wellbeing factors. They are the conditions that influence how people think, feel, communicate, make decisions and perform every day.
If we take sleep as an example, research has consistently shown that poor sleep can impair attention, decision-making and emotional regulation.
Chronic stress can narrow cognitive focus and reduce flexibility in thinking. Over time, these effects accumulate.
Yet many of these factors remain largely invisible in workplace performance conversations despite their very real influence on how people function day to day. We tend to focus on outputs rather than the conditions that produce them.
This can result in employees being perceived as disengaged, underperforming or lacking capability, when they may actually be experiencing fatigue, burnout or reduced cognitive capacity.
The cause often remains undiscovered while the symptoms become increasingly visible often resulting in employees being “managed out” of the business.
Awareness is not enoughMany organisations have made significant progress in recognising the importance of wellbeing, and that progress should be acknowledged. However, awareness alone is rarely enough.
A wellbeing day, awareness campaign or annual initiative can play an important role in starting conversations, but meaningful change rarely comes from a single moment or action. We don’t expect to have clean and healthy teeth if we brush them once in our lifetime.
Meaningful change comes from the environment people move through each and every day. Culture is often shaped less by what organisations say and more by what people see.
The behaviours leaders model, the boundaries they respect and the expectations they reinforce often become the unwritten rules that shape everyday experience.
Awareness matters, but sustainable change requires conditions that support wellbeing consistently rather than occasionally.
A preventative approachPerhaps one of the biggest opportunities for organisations is to shift from correction to prevention.
If we think about elite sport, performance is rarely viewed in isolation from the conditions that support it.
Sleep, recovery, nutrition, stress management and mindset are all recognised as essential components of performance. Without them, performance inevitably suffers.
Yet workplaces often expect people to perform at a consistently high level without paying the same attention to these foundational factors.
Chronic stress can narrow cognitive focus and reduce flexibility in thinking. Over time, these effects accumulate.
A preventative approach starts by helping people better understand themselves before they reach a point of crisis.
It involves creating environments where people can recognise the early signs of stress, understand what may be contributing to them, and feel supported in taking action. Our bodies are in constant communication with us, but due to overload we are either missing the signs or simply not paying attention to them.
Prevention also recognises that responsibility is shared.
Employees have a vital role in making choices that support their wellbeing, but organisations have an equally important role in creating environments where those choices are realistic, encouraged and supported.
From capability to capacityIf we begin to view performance through the lens of capacity as well as capability, the conversation changes.
Rather than asking only: “How do we improve performance?” We might also ask: “What is affecting this person’s capacity to perform right now?”.
That shift moves the conversation from correction to understanding and, ultimately, to prevention. Because performance is often treated as something we do, but increasingly, it looks more like something we enable.
Sustainable performance requires sustainable people. So the next time you feel as though someone’s capability is dipping, consider if what you are witnessing is actually a capability problem or might it actually be a capacity problem.
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The UK could face a shortage of more than 160,000 AI professionals by 2028 – more than half what will be needed – as demand for digital talent continues to outpace domestic supply, according to a new analysis.
The research from recruiter Robert Walters and payments platform Native Teams has suggested demand for AI professionals in the UK could reach almost 300,000 by 2028, against an estimated domestic supply of just 137,000.
Employers are already investing heavily in AI and automation technologies in an effort to improve operational efficiency and strengthen competitiveness, it argued. But shortages in experienced AI talent are pushing many businesses to look beyond local markets to fill critical roles.
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This trend is only likely to accelerate, with employers’ ability to tap into international skills pools becoming increasingly important. Over the next decade, organisations that benefit most from AI will be those who are able to build and access the talent needed to operationalise it effectively.
In fact, addressing AI talent shortages through international hiring could help support productivity growth of up to 1.5% points annually, the analysis argued.
Phill Brown, global head of market intelligence at Robert Walters, said: “The scale of projected demand for AI talent is expected to significantly outpace domestic supply growth in many advanced economies, including the UK.
“Historically, major advances in technology only translated into meaningful productivity growth once organisations had the workforce capability to implement them at scale. The same dynamic is now emerging with AI, where access to experienced talent will play a defining role in how quickly businesses can convert investment into measurable economic output.
“For the UK, strengthening domestic skills pipelines will remain critical, but access to global expertise is also becoming an increasingly important part of how businesses scale capability and stay competitive,” he added.
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Reform UK would introduce an ‘employers’ migrant labour levy’, making it more expensive to hire workers from overseas.
Robert Jenrick, the party’s economic spokesman, said it would also cut employers’ national insurance for British workers back to 13.8%, but charge the current 15% rate for foreign workers, essentially creating a two-tier employment tax.
At a press conference on Monday, Jenrick promised to put “British workers first, migrants second”.
“For more than 20 years now, we’ve had British workers coming second – undercut by cheap migrant labour, which drives down wages and our people’s quality of life,” he said.
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“According to the government’s own figures, the millions of low-skilled migrants that have been brought into our country and they have cost us hundreds of billions of pounds.
“Not to mention the pressure they place on GP surgeries, on our schools, housing, on the roads. Well, under a Reform government, those days are going to come to an end.”
The employers’ migrant labour levy would affect businesses taking on lower-skilled and low-earning migrants worse than those recruiting their more highly skilled foreign nationals.
This could, Jenrick said, be set at £3,750 per year for a full-time foreign worker on the national living wage – an annual salary of nearly £25,000.
Higher earners from abroad would cost less, with those earning £50,000 attracting an annual levy of £1,500, and just £500 for those earning £100,000 or more.
However, he said specifying the exact rates would be “irresponsible” so far from a general election, adding that a reform government would consult with businesses on the measures.
The levy would raise over £11 billion, according to Reform, funding the cut in employers’ NICs for British workers. Jenrick said the levy would include migrant workers with EU settled status.
He said: “Under Reform, because of this levy, businesses will have to take responsibility for the costs and benefits their hiring decisions have on everyone else.”
He added: “The experiment of letting in millions of low-wage migrants, as millions of Brits languish on benefits, has failed catastrophically. Reform will end it.”
Labour described the policy as Reform’s “latest half-baked plan” that would leave British businesses and British people worse off. A spokesperson said: “Their proposals threaten to hike bills and leave working families paying the price.”
Conservative shadow chancellor Mel Stride said Reform was “throwing out a litany of policies in the hope something sticks”.
He said: “Announcing tens of billions in entirely uncosted promises is not serious. It’s a symptom of a party that deals only in gimmicks and headlines, with no real plan for government.”
In 2024, Reform UK proposed a 20% employers’ NIC on foreign workers, to cure the UK’s “deadly addiction” to cheap overseas labour.
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Thousands of young people are set to benefit from expanded access to employment and wrap-around support services in the coming months, the government has pledged.
The Department for Work and Pensions has said it intends to roll out 180 new ‘Youth Hubs’ across the country, increasing the network to more than 360 sites within the next three years.
The hubs are designed to bring together local mental health and housing support, skills and training opportunities as well as careers guidance and work opportunities, including with links to local employers with live job and apprenticeship opportunities.
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They tend to be co-located in existing local infrastructure, such as sports clubs and libraries, with the aim to make jobcentre-style support more accessible to young people. The intention is that a young person will be no more than one hour away from a Youth Hub by public transport, the DWP added.
The move has followed former Labour health secretary Alan Milburn’s interim report on the challenges facing ‘Neets’, or young people not in employment or education and training.
Work and pensions secretary Pat McFadden said: “We want to make sure young people are getting real, personalised support, that’s not one size fits all. I’ve seen how it can change lives.
“Our Youth Hubs have over the past two years pioneered this approach – bringing job centre services together with mental health support, housing advice and more.
I want to turbocharge this rollout so that every young person has this support within reach that can help them move into learning or earning.”
The DWP added it will now work with local authorities and partner organisations to identify the best locations for the hubs.
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Thursday 2 July 2026, 2:00pm BST
EU member states have until 7 June 2026 to enact legislation in line with the EU Pay Transparency Directive. But what will the new laws mean for employers in the UK, with operations in Europe?
Measures include pay range information in job advertisements, a worker’s right to request information regarding their pay compared to colleagues doing the same work, together with gender pay gap reporting and joint pay assessments.
While the new rules do not directly impact UK organisations, many with offices across the EU have decided they are not going to treat British staff any differently to employees in Europe.
This Personnel Today webinar, in association with Remote, the intelligent infrastructure for employing and paying people everywhere, examines the EU Pay Transparency Directive in detail, how member states are implementing or adapting their laws, and the implications for HR and employers.
Personnel Today editor Rob Moss is joined by Shay Ogunsanya, Managing Counsel at Remote, and his colleague Vic Thatcher, Director of Global Payroll Strategy and Compliance.
Register now to find out:
How employer should review their pay structures How pay and recruitment policies may require greater transparency How many countries have been slow to implement new laws Why the changes are having an impact in the UK, even in organisations without EU operations.This free 60-minute webinar includes a panel discussion and Q&A.
Reserve your place on the webinar now
About our panellists
Vic Thatcher is Director for Global Payroll Strategy and Compliance at Remote. A chartered member of the CIPP and a seasoned payroll strategist with more than 20 years of international experience, Vic leads initiatives that integrate compliance directly into product development – bridging the gap between regulatory requirements and scalable, automated payroll solutions.
Shay Ogunsanya is Managing Counsel, Commercial and Product for Remote. Shay is a qualified commercial lawyer with extensive experience at organisations such as Wolters Kluwer and the Cypriot-Dutch Chamber of Commerce. Passionate about remote work, technology, diversity, and inclusion, he brings a global perspective to legal and business matters.
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Alan Milburn has said businesses should prioritise new starters over existing employees, as a list of the UK’s top apprenticeship employers is published.
The former health secretary and author of the review into young people and work highlighted the decline in apprenticeships for young people. Apprenticeship starts among under-19s have nearly halved in a decade – down from 130,000 to 75,000. Entry-level starts at Level 2, the traditional gateway for school-leavers, have collapsed by 68%.
He added that the UK has seen the largest decline since 2013 in the proportion of young people enrolled in work-based learning programmes of any OECD country.
Writing for the Sunday Times, as it published its top 100 apprenticeship employers list, he said: “Apprenticeships, done well, don’t just fill a vacancy. They open a door that for many young people would otherwise stay shut.
“The organisations in these pages know that. In aerospace and ambulances, banking and broadcasting, they are proving that apprenticeships work – powerfully. A Level 3 apprenticeship delivers over 50% more lifetime economic value than the classroom equivalent. Every successful career starts somewhere, and these employers have chosen to be that somewhere for thousands of young people every year.”
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He said that barriers to getting on an apprenticeship are compounding the problem, saying that application processes are far more complex than for university.
“I understand the pressures employers face,” he said. “The cost of hiring young people has risen. For smaller firms in hospitality, retail and care – the sectors that have historically been the easiest way in – the economics are genuinely difficult.
“But there is a longer-term calculation to make. Migration is falling. The population is ageing. The employers who invest in young people now are not just doing the right thing. They are building the workforce their businesses will depend on in a decade.”
He said the solution is straightforward: “Commit to recruiting apprentices at entry level, not just upskilling existing staff. Work with schools and colleges to make opportunities visible and accessible. Simplify your hiring processes – the multistage application that works for a graduate role is a barrier for a 17-year-old with no track record. Offer the mentoring, structure and patience that turns potential into performance.”
The Sunday Times list is dominated by employers in the military, with the British Army topping the list with over 13,500 apprentices, comprising 17.2% of its workforce. The Royal Navy and Royal Air Force follow, with nearly 7,000 and 4,000 apprentices respectively.
BAE Systems is the UK’s largest private-sector apprenticeship employer, with a record 5,100 apprentices on more than 100 schemes from entry to degree level including nuclear engineering, systems, software engineering, welding, pipefitting and aircraft maintenance.
Busy Bees Nurseries were positioned fifth, with more than 1,100 apprentices, representing 15% of its workforce in the UK. Deloitte is the highest ranking professional services firm on the list, with more than 2,200 apprentices.
Other apprenticeship employers in the top 10 include hospitality business Mitchells and Butlers, Kids Planet Day Nurseries, London Ambulance Service and Amazon.
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The number of job postings for specialist AI roles has increased significantly in the past year according to new analysis by PwC.
The firm’s AI Jobs Barometer found 180,000 such UK job postings in 2025, up 61% on the previous year, returning to levels last seen in 2022.
The analysis, based on more than one billion job adverts globally, shows that UK-based AI hiring has recovered following declines in 2023 and 2024, signalling renewed momentum in demand for AI capabilities across the economy.
Specialist AI jobs now account for 2.2% of the overall job market, up from 1.3% last year. Overall vacancies across the economy were found to have fallen by 6.6%.
PwC said the rebound in AI hiring is being driven by so-called AI user roles – specialists who apply AI effectively within a field of expertise – rather than AI developer roles. AI user roles increased by 65.8 % and now account for the majority of AI-related job demand. In contrast, developer roles grew by 21.6 %.
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Claire Reid, chief technology and innovation officer at PwC, said: “After a period of slower growth, this increased demand for AI skills is encouraging and, whilst still a relatively low proportion of the job market, it signals a step change in how organisations are adopting AI.
“The experimentation phase is over and businesses want to scale and embed the technology properly. This requires specialists who understand the art of the possible, where AI can create value in different situations, and help others do the same. There’s a difference between building an AI-literate workforce and expecting everyone to become an AI specialist overnight.”
PwC’s analysis also points to a “two-track” labour market – depending on whether AI is automating more or less expert tasks – as AI adoption accelerates. Roles where AI removes routine tasks and enables workers to focus on higher-value activities, such as judgment and decision-making, are seeing stronger growth and higher value creation.
This dynamic is reflected in growth rates: roles most enhanced by AI have grown by 39% since 2018, compared with 17% growth in roles where AI is primarily simplifying tasks, making them more accessible.
As AI reshapes jobs and workflows, demand is rising for more advanced, human skills – such as judgment, creativity and leadership – across the workforce. In the UK, the analysis shows jobs in more AI-exposed occupations are seeing faster rates of skills transformation, adapting more rapidly and reshaping capabilities required.
Analysis of 2.4 million US entry-level roles suggests this shift is particularly pronounced in early careers, where roles most exposed to AI are now seven times more likely to require traditionally senior-level skills, such as leadership, creativity and face-to-face interactions. These roles have grown by 35% since 2019, while other entry-level roles have declined by 10%.
Reid added: “The direction of travel is clear – the balance of skills is shifting towards qualities that are harder to automate, such as judgment, creativity and adaptability. For early careers, expectations are rising, but so is the need to help young people bridge the skills gap through other routes like work experience.”
PwC found that AI hiring is increasing across all sectors. Technology, media and telecoms leads on AI intensity, followed by financial services and the public sector.
It also found that wages for workers with AI skills continue to rise, with the average premium reaching 34.2%, up from 11%. This premium varies significantly by sector – peaking at 64% in consumer markets and standing at 12% in government and public sector.
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