NLC Update (14/05/15)

I have been getting lots of enquiries recently from readers in North Lanarkshire who are angry that their equal pay claims have not been pursued by their trade unions.

In some cases people's claims appear to have been dropped or not even taken up in the first place, for reasons that are not entirely clear.

Now this is quite peculiar because all Action 4 Equality Scotland clients who received a 1st wave settlement automatically had a 2nd wave claim pursued as well, rolled over if you like.

So most (A4ES) claimants have claims that run from January 2007 to March 2015 which is the maximum period for 2nd wave claims, i.e. 8 years and 3 months.

If someone joined A4ES after January 2007 then they could still have a maximum claim, as long as this was registered by January 2012.

Because once claims are registered with the Employment Tribunals they jump back five years in time (if the claimant has five years service), in this example from January 2012 to January 2007.

On the other hand if a claim was not registered until, say, January 2014 it could only go back to January 2009 and would therefore be worth 6 years and 3 months at most. 

So my advice to people is to check the details of any offer letter to ensure that these dates and the claim period is correct, otherwise you could be losing out big time.

If a trade union has not pursued a case on someone's behalf, then I would ask them to explain why outright.

Because this is not the way unions behave in other areas of their day-to-day work such as strike ballots or Political Fund Ballots where every member is included in the exercise. 

I've written about this situation before on the blog site and the key point is that if the unions are all about 'collective action' then how can it be fair to leave so many people behind?

If on the other hand a trade union has not pursued someone's case or dropped their case through negligence or incompetence, then my view is that the trade union ought to make that member financially whole again.

Ultimately it may be possible to sue a trade union for negligence in such circumstances, but if you ask me that should not be necessary, because the union really ought to do the right thing by its members.