Glasgow and Trump - Hide the Truth
What does Glasgow City Council have in common with the ghastly old groper Donald Trump?
Well both say that they agree with ending or preventing pay discrimination at the workplace, but just like Glasgow City Council (or its officials at least) Trump has a problem when it comes to transparency and openness.
President Obama's previous administration passed legislation which would have allowed one group of workers to see for themselves how other groups were being paid - a perfectly reasonable, sensible measure if you ask me.
But Daddy Trump and his daughter Ivanka disagree and are scrapping the scheme on the basis that it is 'too burdensome'.
Sound familiar, Glasgow?
Read the following article from Newsweek magazine which has all the details - meantime I think I'll send this post on to the City Council's chief executive, Annemarie O'Donnell.
http://www.newsweek.com/ivanka-backs-trump-administrations-plan-scrap-obama-rules-preventing-pay-656751?
IVANKA BACKS TRUMP ADMINISTRATION'S PLAN TO SCRAP OBAMA RULES PREVENTING PAY DISCRIMINATION
BY CALLUM PATON - Newsweek
The White House, with the backing of Ivanka Trump, will end an Obama-era policy that would have required business owners to document how much they pay their workers alongside their gender, race and ethnicity.
The Trump administration is scrapping the scheme, which was due to come into force in the spring this year, on the basis that it will be a burden to employers. The data-collection requirement was proposed by Obama in 2016 as part of a drive to rectify pay inequality among different minority groups, the Wall Street Journal reported.
“It’s enormously burdensome,” Neomi Raom an administrator from the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs said. “We don’t believe it would actually help us gather information about wage and employment discrimination," she added.
Under the scheme, employers with 100 or more employees would have needed to hand over data on employment and wages to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC).
The White House has said the new data that would have to be supplied would not comply with the federal Paperwork Reduction Act because of its sheer volume. Officials also said they doubted whether the data would reflect the realities of pay disparity.
Ivanka Trump who, with her husband Jared Kushner, had been the hope of moderates trying to gain influence in the White House, has backed the scrapping of the initiative. While she has pushed for equal pay for women, Ivanka said in a statement the policy would not lead to pay equality.
“Ultimately, while I believe the intention was good and agree that pay transparency is important, the proposed policy would not yield the intended results,”Ivanka said in a statement. “We look forward to continuing to work with EEOC, [the Office of Management and Budget], Congress and all relevant stakeholders on robust policies aimed at eliminating the gender wage gap,” she added.
Proponents of the Obama-era plan have defended it on the grounds that it would have created an evidence-based foundation on which to address pay discrimination.
“We’d learn about a pay-discrimination problem because someone saw a piece of paper left on a copy machine or someone was complaining about their salary to co-workers,” Jenny Yang, chairwoman of the EEOC said when the rules were drafted. “Having pay data in summary form will also help us identify patterns that may warrant further investigation,” she added at a June conference.
Glasgow - The Next Steps (01/09/17)
Lots of readers have been in touch to ask what's happening in Glasgow after the big Court of Session decision which drove a 'coach and horses' through the City Council's WPBR pay arrangements.
Now I can't speak for the City Council itself, but there have been informal discussions taking place behind the scenes and here is my understanding of the current position being adopted by the new SNP-led administration.
The senior officials have a vested interest in defending previous advice they have given (and previous administrations have given) even though their advice looks ridiculous in the wake of the Court of Session decision which judged Glasgow's pay arrangements and job evaluation scheme (JES) to be 'unfit for purpose'.
Instead of having the truth dragged out of them bit by bit, or via a succession of FoI requests, surely the Council's senior officials should be preparing a detailed report which fills in all the missing pieces of the jigsaw, also know as the Workforce Pay and Benefits Review (WPBR).
Most likely this will require a fundamental reappraisal and possible replacement of the WPBR which was heavily criticised in the Court of Session for its lack of 'independence'.
As regular readers know, Glasgow brought in and paid for a private consultant to concoct an 'in-house' job evaluation scheme which the local unions went along with at the time, against the advice of COSLA and national union officials.
The City Council recently agreed to provide a whole new raft of pay data by early October 2017 and this will be a crucial test of its good faith and commitment to getting serious settlement negotiations underway soon.
If the City Council doesn't deliver on this commitment, then all bets will be off and the Action 4 Equality Scotland equal pay campaign in Glasgow will start again in earnest, because a clear timetable has to be set for settlement discussions to begin and conclude which is, of course, what you would expect in any major negotiation.
For my part, I am going to continue my FoI requests until there is some sign that the City Council's senior officials are listening since it is, and was, their job (and their predecessors' jobs) to look after the interests of all Glasgow employees - including the lowest paid.
Whereas the track record of Glasgow City Council over the past 10 years has been to devise and then defend a pay 'stitch-up' (via the WPBR) on behalf of the former bonus earning, male dominated groups.
Now I can't speak for the City Council itself, but there have been informal discussions taking place behind the scenes and here is my understanding of the current position being adopted by the new SNP-led administration.
- The Council has restated that it wishes to achieve a negotiated settlement of all the outstanding equal pay claims.
- The Council has also restated that it does not wish to continue with a prolonged legal battle, but has still to confirm whether it intends to seek 'leave to appeal' the second Court of Session decision to the UK Supreme Court.
- The Council is currently assessing its options for taking these issues forward and aims to set out clear proposals within the next few weeks.
- The Council remains committed to 'open, honest and transparent' pay arrangements, but recognises there is much more still to do such as achieving the required level of co-operation from the relevant officials.
The senior officials have a vested interest in defending previous advice they have given (and previous administrations have given) even though their advice looks ridiculous in the wake of the Court of Session decision which judged Glasgow's pay arrangements and job evaluation scheme (JES) to be 'unfit for purpose'.
Instead of having the truth dragged out of them bit by bit, or via a succession of FoI requests, surely the Council's senior officials should be preparing a detailed report which fills in all the missing pieces of the jigsaw, also know as the Workforce Pay and Benefits Review (WPBR).
Most likely this will require a fundamental reappraisal and possible replacement of the WPBR which was heavily criticised in the Court of Session for its lack of 'independence'.
As regular readers know, Glasgow brought in and paid for a private consultant to concoct an 'in-house' job evaluation scheme which the local unions went along with at the time, against the advice of COSLA and national union officials.
The City Council recently agreed to provide a whole new raft of pay data by early October 2017 and this will be a crucial test of its good faith and commitment to getting serious settlement negotiations underway soon.
If the City Council doesn't deliver on this commitment, then all bets will be off and the Action 4 Equality Scotland equal pay campaign in Glasgow will start again in earnest, because a clear timetable has to be set for settlement discussions to begin and conclude which is, of course, what you would expect in any major negotiation.
For my part, I am going to continue my FoI requests until there is some sign that the City Council's senior officials are listening since it is, and was, their job (and their predecessors' jobs) to look after the interests of all Glasgow employees - including the lowest paid.
Whereas the track record of Glasgow City Council over the past 10 years has been to devise and then defend a pay 'stitch-up' (via the WPBR) on behalf of the former bonus earning, male dominated groups.
