Job Evaluation - Friend or Foe?
East Lothian Council has recently introduced a new Job Evaluation Scheme (JES) and has agreed to provide details of the new grades to Stefan Cross - other councils, West Lothian for example, are in a similar position.
The potential significance of the new JES grades is that for years it has been common ground - amongst the employers and trade unions - that many female dominated council jobs have been badly undervalued for years - it follows, therefore, they must also have been badly underpaid.
For example, carers, learning assistants, catering workers, admin and clerical workers - to name a few - have all been paid (for the past 10 years) much less than refuse workers and gardeners.
A new Job Evaluation Scheme can tackle this problem and - potentially at least - level the playing field between male and female jobs - but the big issue is always about how any new scheme is applied in practice.
The devil is in the detail, as always, but in theory a new JES - based on objective and fair criteria, which are consistently applied - is what Single Status is all about - and this is what the trade unions and employers agreed to introduce back in 1999.
But they never did, of course - and they're only doing so now because of the pressure councils are under from Action 4 Equality Scotland and Stefan Cross.
So, if East Lothian's new grades put a female dominated job on the same or higher grade than the traditionally much better paid male jobs - then the case for equal pay (and back pay) has taken a step forward - because it looks even more open and shut.
The reason being that the employers can't have their cake and eat it.
Because if female jobs are now finally doing better out of the JES process - by achieving parity or better in terms of grades - our view is that it simply underlines the extent to which these female jobs have been undervalued and underpaid all these years!
So, we shall see what come out of the JES process in East Lothian, but there are still big issues with JES schemes elsewhere.
The potential significance of the new JES grades is that for years it has been common ground - amongst the employers and trade unions - that many female dominated council jobs have been badly undervalued for years - it follows, therefore, they must also have been badly underpaid.
For example, carers, learning assistants, catering workers, admin and clerical workers - to name a few - have all been paid (for the past 10 years) much less than refuse workers and gardeners.
A new Job Evaluation Scheme can tackle this problem and - potentially at least - level the playing field between male and female jobs - but the big issue is always about how any new scheme is applied in practice.
The devil is in the detail, as always, but in theory a new JES - based on objective and fair criteria, which are consistently applied - is what Single Status is all about - and this is what the trade unions and employers agreed to introduce back in 1999.
But they never did, of course - and they're only doing so now because of the pressure councils are under from Action 4 Equality Scotland and Stefan Cross.
So, if East Lothian's new grades put a female dominated job on the same or higher grade than the traditionally much better paid male jobs - then the case for equal pay (and back pay) has taken a step forward - because it looks even more open and shut.
The reason being that the employers can't have their cake and eat it.
Because if female jobs are now finally doing better out of the JES process - by achieving parity or better in terms of grades - our view is that it simply underlines the extent to which these female jobs have been undervalued and underpaid all these years!
So, we shall see what come out of the JES process in East Lothian, but there are still big issues with JES schemes elsewhere.
Our view is that many of them continue to discriminate and that many female dominated jobs have not done nearly as well as their skills and responsibilities merit.
Glasgow, Falkirk, Fife and North Lanarkshire are examples of council JES schemes which have failed to deliver the goods - in our opinion - and which are open to further challenge.
