Glasgow - Rewarding Failure

I plan to publish the salaries paid to all of Glasgow City Council's senior officials on the blog site over the next few days, but to kick things off here is the remuneration package for the Council's Chief Executive, Annemarie O'Donnell, for the year to 31 March 2017.

Basic Salary - £167,853

Election Duty Fees - £46,662

Employer's Pension Contribution - £38,345

Total Remuneration - £252,860

Now 2017 was the year in which the scandal of equal pay in Glasgow City Council finally came under the spotlight as the Court of Session, Scotland's highest civil court, handed down its damning and unanimous judgement - that the pay arrangements of Scotland's largest council are 'unfit for purpose'.

To add insult to injury, Glasgow City Council now claims to have no proper records to clarify how its controversial WPBR pay scheme was put in place back in 2005/06/07 and senior officials are either unwilling or unable to explain:

the WPBR's Terms of Reference
the WPBR's procurement arrangements
the cost of the WPBR to the public purse

I don't know about anyone else, but this seems to me like a classic case of 'rewarding failure' with an eye-watering salary package which dwarfs that of the Prime Minister, Theresa May, and Scotland's First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon.

It really is a disgrace when Glasgow City Council is in such a scandalous mess over equal pay.

Glasgow - Equal Pay Update (09/01/18)

Here's an interesting article from 'Holyrood Magazine' which was published back in 2014 just as Annemarie O'Donnell's was appointed as the new and first woman chief executive of Glasgow City Council.

The upshot is that Annemarie has been in a variety of senior positions within the council for a very long time - through the Christmas 2005 'capped' settlement offers, the introduction of the WPBR in 2007 and the establishment of Glasgow's ALEOs - before succeeding Ian Drummond as executive director of corporate services and then George Black as CEO.

What puzzles me though is why there has been such a long and hard fight for equal pay in Glasgow when the City Council has such powerful women in its senior ranks?

Regular readers will know that Carole Forrest succeeded Annemarie as executive director of corporate services (which deals with Freedom of Information requests) and that Glasgow now has a woman Lord Provost (Eva Bolander) and a woman council leader (Susan Aitken).

The political changes at the top of the City Council are relatively recent, of course, but isn't it remarkable that the battle over equal pay has been so fierce in Glasgow - even with women officials in the most senior positions.

https://www.holyrood.com/articles/news/new-chief-executive-glasgow-city-council

New chief executive for Glasgow City Council

Written by Kate Shannon on 12 November 2014 in News

Annemarie O’Donnell has been appointed

Glasgow City Council has appointed a new chief executive to replace George Black, who retires next month.

Annemarie O’Donnell, who has been the council’s executive director of corporate services since 2011, was chosen for the role last week.

Black announced his retirement in August and will leave the council on 11 December.

Councillor Gordon Matheson, leader of Glasgow City Council, said: “The quality of candidates was exceptionally high but Annemarie brings a wealth of experience, passion and vision to the role and was the unanimous choice of the interview panel.

"There has never been a more exciting time to work in Glasgow, with the city in the spotlight like never before following the best ever Commonwealth Games and the signing of Scotland’s first city deal. I am in no doubt that Annemarie is the best possible choice to lead our dedicated and talented staff through the next chapter in our city’s long and proud history.

“I also want to take this opportunity to thank George Black for his exceptional work on behalf of the city and wish him every happiness and success in the future.”

I believe we have the energy, the ideas and, crucially, the best people to meet those challenges

O’Donnell, 49, is a qualified solicitor and a member of the Law Society of Scotland. She has two adult children and her husband is a lawyer specialising in criminal law.

After joining Glasgow District Council from a legal practice in the east end of Glasgow in 1991, she worked as a solicitor and then senior solicitor in a team focusing on construction, housing and planning.

Following local government reorganisation in 1996, she was promoted to chief solicitor, leading the council’s work on commercial contracts, procurement, planning and environmental law.

In 2003, O’Donnell was appointed assistant head of legal and administrative services, a new post that saw her take responsibility for the running of elections for the first time – along with committee services, registrars, litigation, licensing and corporate law.

Following a two year secondment as deputy director of social work services, she returned to corporate services in 2007, serving as assistant director and head of external governance as the council established its ALEOs.
She said: “I am delighted and humbled to have been appointed. This is a really exciting time for Glasgow. There is no doubt the next few years will be challenging for everyone in local government. But I believe we have the energy, the ideas and, crucially, the best people to meet those challenges.”

Read Holyrood’s full interview with George Black here.

Glasgow - Equal Pay Update (22/03/18)

Here's the letter I mentioned on the blog yesterday from Glasgow City Council's chief executive Annemarie O'Donnell.

Now I am quite astonished, I have too say, that such a poor letter can be written by the highest paid local government official in the whole of Scotland (more on this issue to follow soon).

So I have pasted a copy of the original letter on the blog, first of all, followed by a second version into which I have inserted my own comments in bold (setting the record straight) where Annemarie O'Donnell is putting forward a point of view that needs to be challenged.

Dear XXXX,

EQUAL PAY FOR GLASGOW CITY COUNCIL WORKERS

Thank you for writing to me about the current Equal Pay negotiations and specifically the future of the current WPBR pay and grading scheme.

I’m afraid that I cannot agree with you that there is a lack of progress being made. These are extremely complex discussions and it was the claimants’ representatives who took the view that a year would be required to resolve issues. This was based on their experience of similar negotiations with other councils in Scotland and across the UK. Senior officers are meeting the claimants’ representatives every fortnight and progress is being made. In particular the council is developing an approach to the processing of payments for pay protection.

Turning to your view that the WPBR requires to be replaced with the Red Book Scheme, I can advise you that the meeting of officers and claimant representatives, last week, agreed to set up a separate work stream to review the current scheme and take whatever action is necessary, based on that review. The working group is composed of council officers but also representatives of the trade unions whose members would be affected by any new or substantially revised pay and grading scheme, together with a representative of A4E (Action for Equality).

I believe that we must give the working group the space to do their work and then consider their recommendations when these are presented.

In terms of your request that the council should offer an apology, that implies that senior officers and the council at the time consciously set out to discriminate against female workers. I simply do not accept that. Instead I believe that acting in good faith, officers and the council sought to put in place arrangements which they believed removed discrimination from the council’s pay arrangements. If through the ongoing discussion and analysis that benefit is found to be erroneous the council is fully prepared to take steps to rectify this.

Yours sincerely,

ANNEMARIE O’DONNELL CHIEF EXECUTIVE

cc Robert Anderson, Executive HR Manager

Chief Executive
Annemarie O’Donnell LLB DipLP

Chief Executive’s Office
Glasgow City Council
City Chambers
George Square
Glasgow G2 1DU
Email: annemarie.odonnell@glasgow.gov.uk

Dear Xxxxxx,

EQUAL PAY FOR GLASGOW CITY COUNCIL WORKERS

Thank you for writing to me about the current Equal Pay negotiations and specifically the future of the current WPBR pay and grading scheme.

I’m afraid that I cannot agree with you that there is a lack of progress being made. These are extremely complex discussions and it was the claimants’ representatives who took the view that a year would be required to resolve issues. This was based on their experience of similar negotiations with other councils in Scotland and across the UK. Senior officers are meeting the claimants’ representatives every fortnight and progress is being made. In particular the council is developing an approach to the processing of payments for pay protection.

1) According to the latest update posted by Stefan Cross "no real negotiations yet. We've not even received a considered response to our protection period figures which we presented to the council in January."

2) The claimants' representatives have never suggested that settlement negotiations will take a year - a point which has been made repeatedly to councillors and council officials

3) GCC officials have previously threatened to 'impose' a payment for the protection period which the claimants' representatives have warned the council against - a piecemeal settlement is simply not acceptable after all this time.

Turning to your view that the WPBR requires to be replaced with the Red Book Scheme, I can advise you that the meeting of officers and claimant representatives, last week, agreed to set up a separate work stream to review the current scheme and take whatever action is necessary, based on that review. The working group is composed of council officers but also representatives of the trade unions whose members would be affected by any new or substantially revised pay and grading scheme, together with a representative of A4E (Action for Equality).

4) GCC officials insisted on removing the words 'replace the WPBR' from the Terms of Reference of the Working Group.

5) In reality the senior council officials who have been defending the WPBR for years are trying desperately to retain the scheme or elements of the scheme - despite the WPBR being condemned as 'unfit for purpose' by the Court of Session, the highest civil court in Scotland.

I believe that we must give the working group the space to do their work and then consider their recommendations when these are presented.

6) Significantly, no clear timescale is given for the working group to complete its task or present its recommendations.

In terms of your request that the council should offer an apology, that implies that senior officers and the council at the time consciously set out to discriminate against female workers. I simply do not accept that. Instead I believe that acting in good faith, officers and the council sought to put in place arrangements which they believed removed discrimination from the council’s pay arrangements. If through the ongoing discussion and analysis that benefit is found to be erroneous the council is fully prepared to take steps to rectify this.

7) The WPBR has been deliberately designed to favour traditional male jobs - hence the blatantly discriminatory 37 hour 'rule' which treats women workers as second class citizens and punishes the council's largely female workforce.

8) The cockamamy 'rules' of the WPBR were drawn up by an external consultant working in association with and under the direction of senior council officials who now say they cannot find the WPBR's original Terms of Reference.

9) How could any knowledgeable person (never mind the highest paid council official in Scotland) believe that the introduction of a 37 hour 'rule' under the WPBR was intended to 'remove discrimination from the council's pay arrangements' in 2007?

10) The Court of Session's 'unfit for purpose' decision speaks volumes about the poor judgment of the senior officials in Glasgow who introduced the WPBR pay scheme and who fought tooth and nail to defend its operation for 10 long years.

Yours sincerely,

ANNEMARIE O’DONNELL CHIEF EXECUTIVE

cc Robert Anderson, Executive HR Manager

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