Home Carers and JE

There has been a lot of interest in yesterday's post about Home Carers and the late-running job evaluation (JE) exercise that is taking place in North Lanarkshire Council which should have been completed, of course, before the end of December 2015.

The good news for A4ES clients is that Daphne Romney QC is being lined up to conduct a detailed assessment of the exercise and the comparative scores of male and female jobs, as soon as the exercise is completed. 

As regular readers know, Daphne Romney effectively drove a 'coach and horses' through North Lanarkshire's much criticised 2006/07 JE scheme which I wrote about on the blog site as far back as December 2007 - see post below.

So this is a really big deal for Home Carers because the JE review will determine people's rates of pay going forward and pay increases due will be backdated to 1 April 2015.

The important point is that Home Carers and other Council employees should understand how job evaluation works - JE is a comparative exercise which ranks jobs in a pecking order on the basis of their respective duties, skill levels and responsibilities.

The last time round (in 2006/07) North Lanarkshire introduced a JE scheme which treated male dominated jobs more favourably than female jobs and those pay arrangements would still be in place today, if Action 4 Equality Scotland hadn't come along and upset the Council's applecart. 

Tomorrow I will start posting information about the job evaluation scores awarded to male dominated jobs under the 2006/07 JE scheme.

So watch this space.

Here are the scores awarded to Home Carers' jobs in North Lanarkshire under the Council's much criticised 2006/07 job evaluation scheme (JES).

1. Working Environment (WE) - 1
2. Physical Coordination (PC) - 2
3. Physical Effort (PE) - 2
4. Mental Skills (MS) - 1
5. Concentration (CON) - 2
6. Communications Skills (COMMS) - 1 
7. Dealing with Relationships (DWR) - 3
8. Responsibility for Employees (EMP) - 1
9. Responsibility for Services to Others (STO) - 2 
10. Responsibility for Financial Resources (FIN) - 1
11. Responsibility for Physical and Information Resources (PIR) - 2
12. Initiative and Independence (I and I) - 2 
13. Knowledge (KN) - 2

Now the total score awarded originally to NLC Home Carers was 248 points (remember Factor Levels are 'weighted') which resulted in a grade of only NLC 3 under the 2006/07 job evaluation scheme (JES).

But this JE assessment was completely torn to shreds by Daphne Romney QC, the indomitable barrister acting for A4ES clients at the long-running Employment Tribunal hearing in Glasgow, which caused the Council's defences to collapse.

In other words, NLC was forced to agree that the Home Carers scores and grades had been manipulated by senior management and were not fit to be relied upon because they did not accurately reflect the duties and responsibilities of the carers' job   

A highly significant point is that before the Council's new 2006/07 job evaluation scheme NLC Home Carers were previously on the same Manual Worker grade (MW5) or a higher grade than the following traditional male dominated jobs:  

Gardener

Estates Maintenance Worker

Storeperson/Driver

Greenkeeper

Recycling Attendant

Gardener (3)

Gravedigger

Driver 2

Janitor

Yet after the 2006/07 JE exercise the council's Home Carers ended up on a lowly grade of NLC 3 while all the male jobs leapfrogged over their women colleagues and onto to much higher and better paid grades of NLC 4, 5 and 6.

Gardener - NLC 4

Estates Maintenance Worker - NLC4

Storeperson/Driver - NLC 4

Greenkeeper - NLC5

Recycling Attendant - NLC 5

Gardener (3) - NLC 6

Gravedigger - NLC 6

Refuse Driver 2 - NLC 6

School Janitor - NLC 6

As I've pointed out on the blog site before, if this were a game of 'Snakes and Ladders' all the women's jobs have anded on a downwards 'snake' while all the male jobs landed on an upwards 'ladder'. 

Which is impossible, of course, without a 'hidden hand' at work and that's why North Lanarkshire's case crumbled and finally fell apart at the Glasgow Employment Tribunal.

Next I'm going to look at the scores awarded to some of the male comparators because these jobs are all being re-examined as part of the equal pay settlement with NLC - a JES review that was supposed to have been completed before the end of December 2015.

So watch this space and prepare to get really mad if you're a Home Carer in Labour-run North Lanarkshire Council.

Because this is a really big deal.