Glasgow's Fight for Equal Pay

I agree, but it's also fair to point out that one of the first acts of the new SNP-led Glasgow City Council in 2017 was to appeal and try to overturn the landmark equal pay decision of the Court of Session @MonicaLennon7

— Mark Irvine (@Mark1957) February 19, 2021

I had to respond to one of my local councillors, Cllr Greg Hepburn, who tweeted about the fight for equal pay in Glasgow City Council the other day.

Now Greg (a decent chap and a good councillor in my view) , agreed with Labour's Monica Lennon that the last Labour council should not have hidden behind legal advice over its pay arrangements which proved to be discriminatory.

But what also has to be said is that in 2017 the new SNP-led Glasgow launched an appeal and tried to overturn the landmark decision from the Court of Session which judged the City Council's WPBR pay arrangements to be unlawful and 'unfit for purpose'.

Glasgow's legal advice on equal pay has still not been published even by the new SNP-led council which, I'm sorry to say, is just as bad as its predecessors when it comes to freedom of information (FoI), openness and transparency. 

 

Glasgow - Court of Session (09/10/17)

The A4ES legal team is meeting this week to finalise its response to Glasgow City Council's application seeking leave to appeal the Court of Session decision which judged the council's WPBR pay scheme to be 'unfit for purpose'.

I will share the A4ES 'answers' once they have been lodged and come to think of it I will also publish Glasgow's application so that readers can see for themselves what the City Council is saying in support of a further appeal to the UK Supreme Court.

Now I am optimistic about seeing off GCC's application for leave to appeal because in my view the Council's case is very weak - in fact it's just a rehash of the unsuccessful arguments Glasgow made at the original Court of Session hearing.

For example, the City Council raises the cost implications of the judgment, but I fail to see how that can have any bearing on the outcome since the cost represents 'loss of income' to thousands of low paid women claimants who have been paid so much less than their male comparators for the past 10 years.

So setting aside the enormous political problems an appeal to the UK Supreme Court would present to an SNP led Glasgow, I expect the City Council to lose its application although, frustratingly, that is not necessarily the end of the matter.

Because the City Council could then make a further application direct to the UK Supreme Court, despite having repeatedly pledged to end the litigation and resolve all the outstanding equal pay cases by negotiation.

We shall see what happens and I understand that we can expect to hear the outcome of GCC's application next month, i.e. sometime in November.

A4ES and Unison are working together on this issue, by the way, which is good news for all the claimants, but the ridiculous GMB is not involved because the union was not part of the original appeal to the Court of Session.

  

Glasgow - Court of Session (08/10/17)

A reader from Glasgow passed on the following comment from a work colleague regarding the City Council's decision to seek leave to appeal the decision of the Court of Session which found the WPBR pay scheme to be 'unfit for purpose'.

"How come an SNP council is trying to raise the case in the UK supreme court, is a Scottish judicial decision not good enough?"

Now that's a very good point, I have to admit.

Especially when you consider that the Court of Session is Scotland's highest civil court and that the CoS delivered a cogent, powerful and unanimous judgment .

So if GCC were to be granted leave to appeal, the SNP will look pretty ridiculous if it sets off to the UK Supreme Court in London to overturn the considered views of three  senior Scottish judges.    

But I don't think that is going to happen for reasons I will explain on the blog site later today.