Who Runs Glasgow City Council?
While senior officials in Glasgow City Council continue to defend and hide behind their WPBR Pay Monster, councillors from the Green Party appear to have taken a principled stand.
Here's the response one Glasgow claimant received from a Green Party councillor, Kim Long.
Dear Amanda,
Thanks for your email.
As I said in my previous response, the Green Cllrs group do not have faith in the current WPBR scheme used by Glasgow since 2006.
We value our staff and we as Greens will work towards a whole new pay system that is transparent, consistent and fair.
Many thanks,
Kim
Now this sounds encouraging to me so I think I'll drop Kim Long a friendly note with an offer to brief the Green Councillors group, in a similar fashion to the briefing that was held for Glasgow's MSPs and MPs recently.
I've already put this suggestion to Councillor Robert Connelly and his colleagues, but I have not heard anything back from the SNP Group or the Labour Group whose Scottish leader, Richard Leonard, recently backed the call for an apology to be made to Glasgow's equal pay claimants.
If you ask me, the whole issue boils down to: Who runs Glasgow City Council - the elected politicians or its highly paid officials?
After 12 years of the officials running the show over equal paying the WPBR, I think it's high time this question was answered.
Many thanks,
Kim
Now this sounds encouraging to me so I think I'll drop Kim Long a friendly note with an offer to brief the Green Councillors group, in a similar fashion to the briefing that was held for Glasgow's MSPs and MPs recently.
I've already put this suggestion to Councillor Robert Connelly and his colleagues, but I have not heard anything back from the SNP Group or the Labour Group whose Scottish leader, Richard Leonard, recently backed the call for an apology to be made to Glasgow's equal pay claimants.
If you ask me, the whole issue boils down to: Who runs Glasgow City Council - the elected politicians or its highly paid officials?
After 12 years of the officials running the show over equal paying the WPBR, I think it's high time this question was answered.
Glasgow's 'Unfit For Purpose' WPBR
"Glasgow City Council accepts with the unanimous judgment of the Court of Session, Scotland's highest civil court, that its Workforce Pay and Benefits Review (WPBR) is 'unfit for purpose'.
"Council therefore instructs senior officials to replace the WPBR scheme, as a matter of urgency, to bring to an end discriminatory practices which treat its low paid women workers as second class citizens.
"Council further instructs senior officials to draw up plans for using the Gauge job evaluation scheme (JES) as a replacement for the WPBR.
"Council notes that the Gauge JES was originally recommended for use by the Scottish council employers via COSLA and the national trade unions (GMB, Unison and Unite), as part of the landmark 1999 Single Status (Equal Pay) Agreement."
