North Lanarkshire Update

A reader from North Lanarkshire has sent me the following enquiry regarding equal pay:

Hi Mark,

I am after your advice on employees who started after the initial wave of equal pay disputes but are within the backdated dates of the new pay scale. 

I started with NLC in October 2015 as a Home Support Worker but have been discriminated against, in my view, of equal pay from my start date to June 2016. 

I can't understand why anyone who started after the initial equal pay dispute should be penalised after the results of  the independent job evaluation graded the role as a band 7. 

Surely then all employees should have been backdated till April 2015, if this is not then do we not have an equal pay case for that period?

I would be grateful for any advice you can give me at this point.

Thanking you

B

Now I haven't seen anything in writing to explain North Lanarkshire's position on this issue, but if the reader is correct the Council is applying the new rate of pay and NLC Grade 7 only to Home Support Workers with an outstanding equal pay claim.

Which sounds odd to me since the whole point of a JE exercise is to establish grades and rates of pay that apply to the post - not individual postholders.  

  

NLC Update (15/06/16)

I received a nice email from a regular reader in North Lanarkshire who is less than impressed, understandably, over the lack of support from the trade unions in connection with the Council's job evaluation (JE) review.

"I am totally disgusted that Unison once again have not fought for us Clerical with regards to the recent JE. I have messaged Unison but no reply, well how does that not surprise me. 

"Bragging they have done this, they have done that, for us lowest paid, when really they have done nothing at all but line their own pockets with our monthly contributions. I have to say Mark if it was not for action4equality we would not know what is going on, so thank you for your blog page, at least someone is standing up for our rights. 

"Wish you were our UNION, I would gladly pay fees to you!!"

K

Now I can understand why the Council and senior managers would wish to exclude people and restrict the scope of the JE exercise, but I have no idea why union leaders would go along with such a move because it's clearly against the interests of ordinary union members.

So the question I would be asking if I were a union member in North Lanarkshire today is "Who made this decision and why?"

Time for some straight talking.

NLC JE Review (12/06/16)

I submitted a freedom of information (FoI) request to North Lanarkshire Council on Friday (10 May) asking for details of the report to the Policy & Resources Committee on the Council's late-running job evaluation (JE) review.

But later that day a helpful contact from within the Council sent me a copy of the report and here is a summary of the main outcomes as far as JE is concerned.

Claimant Jobs

Home Support Workers - Existing Grade NLC 3, New Grade NLC 7

School Crossing Patrollers - Existing Grade NLC 2, New Grade NLC 3

Playground Supervisors - Existing Grade NLC 2, New Grade NLC 2 (no change)


Male Comparator Jobs

Road Sweeper - Existing Grade NLC 2, New Grade NLC 3

Refuse Collector - Existing Grade NLC 4, New Grade NLC 4

Gardener (4) - Existing Grade NLC 4, New Grade NLC 5

Gardener (5) - Existing Grade NLC 5, New Grade NLC 5

Chargehand Gardener - Existing Grade NLC 6, New Grade NLC 7

So two out of three claimant jobs have seen their grades increase (notably the Home Carers) and three out of five male comparator jobs and the new grades will be backdated to 1 April 2015.

However lots of predominantly female job groups have been left out of the JE review which will, I suspect, make many people very angry.

So the trade unions have a lot of explaining to do especially to fee-paying members who have been excluded from the review process.