NLC Feedback
A number of readers from North Lanarkshire have been in touch with concerns about some ongoing local issues.
Apparently, the Council is continuing to employ Home Care Workers on different rates of pay even though the staff concerned are all doing ostensibly the same job.
"So what's all this about?", people are asking.
Now the honest answer is I don't know because it does seem decidedly odd and virtually impossible to justify if you ask me, so what I would do is write directly to the Council's Head of Human Resources (Iris Wylie) and ask for a proper explanation.
I believe Iris Wylie's email address at NLC is:wyliei@northlan.gov.uk
The next concern has to do with Freedom of Information because back in May union members were encouraged by their unions to raise FoI requests with North Lanarkshire Council - which the Council has still to answer after all this time.
The Council is now telling people that they no longer need to answer these FoI requests because of ongoing discussions with the trade unions, but I don't think they are entitled to behave in this way under the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 which lays down strict time limits for public bodies like NLC to respond.
Now I have no idea why the Council appears to be speaking for the unions and their members, but what I would do is to bang in an FoI Review Request which will force the Council to reply properly, because otherwise the matter can be appealed to the Scottish Information Commissioner.
And North Lanarkshire Council won't like that, I can tell you.
The final matter is the case of the recent trade union ballot on interim changes to the Council JES and pay arrangements that flow from the JES.
Different versions about the result of the ballot are doing the rounds apparently, but union members are entitled to know the details of the turnout and number of votes cast For and Against - and in my view this information ought to be published as a matter of routine.
So if I were a union member in NLC I would drop a note to my union to ask the following questions:
- How many ballot papers were issued in total?
- How many people voted Yes?
- How many people voted No?
Now as regular readers know, I think this whole ballot business is a joke because the unions' attention should be focused on getting all the equal pay claims resolved before agreeing to any further changes to the Job Evaluation Scheme or people's pay arrangements.
