Retail giants M&S, JD Sports and Sainsbury’s face questioning over low pay to some staff as a pressure group confronts their directors at AGMs this week.

ShareAction, which campaigns for responsible investment, aims to quiz retailers’ policies over hourly rates of the lowest-paid workers in order to “protect living standards”, Moneyweek.com reported.

Next and Tesco have already been among several retailers targeted by the group earlier this year.

The pressure group wants the retailers to pay their staff the ‘real living wage’ rather than the government’s legal living wage, which is currently £11.44 an hour. The Living Wage Foundation calculates the real living wage to be £12 an hour nationally and £13.15 in London.

In late February, M&S announced a record £94 million investment to improve staff pay in line with the government-set Real Living Wage. It took effect from 1 April with Customer Assistants’ pay increasing from £10.90 to £12 per hour, representing a 10.1%.

But at its AGM, the group intended to ask it about the situation for third-party contracted staff, including cleaners and security guards.

The activists will also challenge the boards of JD Sports and Sainsbury’s on Thursday (4 July).

Sainsbury’s said it pays staff the real living wage nationally and in London, adding that the vast majority of third-party contractors who work in stores, depots, contact centres and store support centres are already paid at or above the wage.