Glasgow's Pay Arrangements

The workforce at Glasgow City Council is predominantly female - around 70% of its 27,000 or so employees are women.

So, all things being equal, you would expect women to occupy around 70% or of each job category and for women to be involved in 70% or so of all work related issues - from sickness absence and disciplinary hearings to interviews for a promoted post.

Unless, of course, there's a gender based explanation such as maternity or paternity leave - or there's some other factor at play such as discrimination, for example.

Here's an interesting table which shines a light on the payments Glasgow City Council staff receive for doing shift work - the Non-Standard Working Pattern (NSWP) part of Glasgow's Workforce Pay and Benefits review (WPBR). 

NSWP Percentage breakdown Grade 1 to 7
Grade	Male	Female	Totals	% of Males by grade in receipt of NSWP	% of females by grade in receipt of NSWP
0	3293	15441	18734	39.71%	81.07%
A	347	888	1235	4.18%	4.66%
B	2528	1382	3910	30.49%	7.26%
C	566	681	1247	6.83%	3.58%
D	1213	210	1423	14.63%	1.10%
E	20	43	63	0.24%	0.23%
F	325	402	727	3.92%	2.11%
TOTALS	8292	19047	27339	100.00%	100.00%
	In receipt of NSWP
Gender	yes	no	Grand Total	% of All employees	% of employees in receipt of NSWP by gender	% of Gender in receipt of NSWP
Female	3606	15441	19047	69.67%	41.91%	18.93%
Male	4999	3293	8292	30.33%	58.09%	60.29%
TOTALS	8605	18734	27339	100.00%	100.00%	79.22%
					Example: Total Female in receipt of NSWP divided by the overall total of both men and Woman in receipt of NSWP	Example: Total percentage of Female in receipt of NSWP divided by the total number of females employed

The figures are based on the WPBR in 2007 and number of things jump straight out to me:

• Over 80% of women don't qualify for a NSWP payment because they score zero (0) points on the City Council's scoring system 
• Far fewer women (19%) than men (60%) qualify for an NSWP payment even though women make up a big 70% majority of the City Council's workforce
• Over 50% of male workers receive an NSWP payment at the higher paying B, C and D bands
• Yet only 12% of women fall into the B,C and D bands.

Now I don't know who made up Glasgow's cockamamy scoring system, but if you ask me they have made up the rules in a way that punishes and discriminates against the jobs done by women. 

In the next few days I'll publish more information about the NSWP 'rules' and scoring system which I imagine will be of great interest to lots of readers in Glasgow.

As far as I know the unions in Glasgow have not called any strikes or even threatened industrial action over the operation of the NSWP scheme.