Edinburgh - Male Claims
Edinburgh City Council's finance chief - Councillor Gordon MacKenzie - made the following statement in the Evening News on Friday 26 October 2007:
"The legal advice we had was that we did not have to offer compensation payments to the male manual workers, there was not the same level of risk that there is to female workers."
"However, there has been a great deal of discussion within the council over the last week and it was felt that we had to offer both male and female workers the same deal in terms of compensation."
"We've basically agreed that people in the same posts should be paid the same salary regardless of their sex, as it was felt we could have left ourselves open to other legal cases if we treated male workers differently."
Action 4 Equality reported this news at the time - as a victory for common sense - especially as these individuals (i.e male workers in predominantly female jobs) had previously been offered compensation by the council.
So, excluding these male workers at such a late stage was seen for what it was - an act of blatant victimisation, which the council quickly reversed in the face of growing public criticism in the press and media.
But having agreed the principle of correctly including the men, the council is now dragging its feet - while it's clear that the men will be made the same improved offer that's about to be made to their female colleagues - there is some confusion about precisely when this will happen.
Action for Equality will be contacting Councillor Gordon MacKenzie in an effort to clarify what is going on - because leaving people in the dark for possibly weeks, or months, on end is clearly not acceptable.
"The legal advice we had was that we did not have to offer compensation payments to the male manual workers, there was not the same level of risk that there is to female workers."
"However, there has been a great deal of discussion within the council over the last week and it was felt that we had to offer both male and female workers the same deal in terms of compensation."
"We've basically agreed that people in the same posts should be paid the same salary regardless of their sex, as it was felt we could have left ourselves open to other legal cases if we treated male workers differently."
Action 4 Equality reported this news at the time - as a victory for common sense - especially as these individuals (i.e male workers in predominantly female jobs) had previously been offered compensation by the council.
So, excluding these male workers at such a late stage was seen for what it was - an act of blatant victimisation, which the council quickly reversed in the face of growing public criticism in the press and media.
But having agreed the principle of correctly including the men, the council is now dragging its feet - while it's clear that the men will be made the same improved offer that's about to be made to their female colleagues - there is some confusion about precisely when this will happen.
Action for Equality will be contacting Councillor Gordon MacKenzie in an effort to clarify what is going on - because leaving people in the dark for possibly weeks, or months, on end is clearly not acceptable.
