Glasgow City Council Update

The Herald's big domestic news story today is about the ongoing fight for equal pay in Glasgow City Council and here's what my colleague Stefan Cross QC had to say to the paper when asked to comment:   

"This particular part of their case has taken nine years to reach this point and we're obviously delighted for the women that they've got further entitlement.

"The EAT held that Glasgow have failed to properly equalise its pay structure and failed to give proper protection to the women.

"The new pay structure protected the pay for the men but didn't do so for women. It meant in rough terms that a woman on the same grade as a man could be paid £12,000 a year when the man was being paid £18,000.

"What we've effectively been arguing is that the council didn't learn its lesson the first time round."

So let's hope that Glasgow City Council is indeed learning the lessons from its past and that we don't spend the next 12 months or so 'persuading' the leadership of the Council to settle its outstanding equal pay claims.

http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/14374245.Thousands_of_women_to_share_equal_pay_deals_worth_an_estimated___100m/

Thousands of women to share equal pay deals worth an estimated £100m


Women at Glasgow City Council are set to receive substantial payouts as part of a long-running equal pay case


By Victoria Weldon - The Herald

THOUSANDS of women are set to share in a windfall of up to £100 million as part of a long-running equal pay dispute

Around 6,500 female staff at Glasgow City Council are due to receive substantial payouts after they were paid less than male colleagues despite a new wage structure being introduced in 2007 that was designed to close the salary gap between sexes.

Under the system, men benefited from protections that halted sharp falls in their wages. But it meant their female counterparts failed to achieve parity in their salaries even after the local authority was forced to pay out large sums to meet an earlier equal pay ruling.