Then There Were None

All four of North Lanarkshire's Westminster MPs were swept away at the Westminster general election and if you ask me, a bit part of the reason was the failure of these elected representatives to stand up for their local constituents over equal pay.

Lots of people in North Lanarkshire still have issues with equal pay and I would expect the new intake of MPs to be rather more supportive than their predecessors.

So I will publish their contact details on the blog site tomorrow, but given that the 2016 Scottish Parliament elections are now less than 12 months away there's every reason to contact your local MSP for support as well.

North Lanarkshire Labour (14/11/14)

Here are the name and email addresses for the Westminster MPs (all Labour Party by the way) who currently represent constituencies covering the North Lanarkshire Council areas.

Tom Clarke (Labour) - Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill

clarket@parliament.uk


Gregg McClymont (Labour) - Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East 

gregg.mcclymont.mp@parliament.uk


Pamela Nash (Labour) - Airdrie and Shotts

pamela.nash.mp@parliament.uk


Frank Roy (Labour) - Motherwell and Wishaw

royf@parliament.uk

Now I've never heard any of these Labour MPs say anything about equal pay in recent years - I've certainly never heard any one of them speaking up on behalf of their local constituents.

Perhaps they don't want to criticise the behaviour of North Lanarkshire Council because it's a Labour-run council, but how anyone can defend the Council over equal pay is beyond me.

Because NLC and equal pay is a bad joke and the Council's senior officials have been shown to have presided over pay arrangements which discriminated against a largely female workforce.

If this happened in the private sector, I suspect the people responsible would all have been sacked by now.

But, the 'top brass' in North Lanarkshire all stay in post, no one answers for their actions, and in recent years they have even been receiving big bonus payments for good performance supposedly which is a terrible insult to the rest of the Council workforce, if you ask me.

All four Labour MPs are up for re-election in May 2015 and I would be very surprised if North Lanarkshire Council's handling of equal pay doesn't result in a backlash on polling day.   

And if I were an equal pay claimant in North Lanarkshire I would consider dropping these MPs a note and telling them, in no uncertain terms, what I think of the Labour Party's performance.