Mark Irvine

Empty promises and equal pay

Action4Equality's Mark Irvine slams an unfair system and trade union conivance in it

Hands up, who supports equal pay? Everyone does, don’t they, because Scotland has come a long way since women worked just for ‘pin money’.

But, if this is true, why are so many women workers still paid so much less than male colleagues? Especially when women have had the law on their side – the 1970 Equal Pay Act – for almost 40 years? The answer is that employers and trade unions have turned a blind eye to widespread pay discrimination for years. This explains why council carers - with highly demanding and responsible jobs - earn less than relatively unskilled male jobs, such as refuse workers and road sweepers.

Whatever they say about an unshakeable commitment to equality, the big public sector employers have been quietly defending the indefensible for years – and the trade unions have been happy to look the other way. In 1999, Scotland’s local councils and trade unions signed an historic equal pay agreement. The proposed new system was intended to pay all workers fairly – regardless of gender, on the basis of real skills and responsibilities – recognising that old, outdated employer/union agreements undervalued and underpaid many predominantly female jobs.

A new approach required non-discriminatory job evaluation schemes - that assessed and scored jobs relative to one another - to produce a fair and logical set of grades and rates of pay - across the entire workforce. But what actually happened was nothing - for six long years. Then Action 4 Equality and Stefan Cross came along - let the cat out the bag by highlighting the big pay differences between male and female jobs – and explaining how to fight back. Overnight, thousands of women workers started submitting equal pay claims – using the courts to get redress.

Collective bargaining had betrayed the very people it was supposed to serve. Predictably, the employers blamed the trade unions and the unions blamed the employers – even though both sides knew exactly what they were signing for at the time. Worse followed. Instead of being honest and acting with integrity, the unions collaborated with employers to keep their women members in the dark – ignored the huge and ongoing pay gap. This duplicity has led to thousands of low paid women workers suing their own trade unions for the lack of proper legal advice and professional support.

Pay discrimination is also rife in Scotland’s NHS. Again the employers and trade unions came up with a similar solution – Agenda for Change – a new grading system, which has been sold as dealing with equal pay, but is nothing of the sort. Instead, Agenda for Change is a mechanism for protecting men's pay and avoiding equal pay claims. NHS pay structures are completely crazy. The equal pay gap has been widely known to employers and unions - since 1997 at least - when large-scale claims were first made in Cumbria.

Cumbria’s claims established that nursing assistants did jobs of equal value to male maintenance workers, but the men were being paid £4,000 more than the (largely female) nurses. Likewise, fully trained and highly qualified nurses earned less than male electronics technicians - medical secretaries less then male painters and joiners. Even senior nurses - with years of specialist training - were paid less than junior maintenance managers. So the people looking after property were paid more than those caring for patients!

Recent events have shown unions up in their true colours. Unions like to portray themselves as champions of equal pay, but collective bargaining has let women workers down – big time. The difference is that people now have a choice – they don’t need to stay trapped inside the secret world of employer/union agreements – a kind of industrial relations ‘black hole’. That’s why so many are prepared to hold the unions to account – and consider other solutions to their problems.
Scotland’s unions have lost the plot on equal pay. Women workers have been betrayed by a tribal male culture, driven by windy rhetoric, wedded to one political party, compromised and ultimately paralysed by its own vested interests.

For the latest news on equal pay visit the Action4Equality website www.action4equalityscotland.blogspot.com

Comments

[S Norman]

Anyone know what is happening in the Angus area as I don't think anything ever will!! Seem to have been waiting forever on news of equal pay in Angus. About time something changed.

[Ian Patton]

My feelings about Unions and Administration is that they are evil twins ... a pox on both their houses.

[n.fyffe]

does anyone know whats happening in perth and kinross area as i have heard nothing for a long tim

[wendy tait]

dose anyone know whats happening in aberdeenshire

[valerie kerr]

anybody know what happening with N A C ,

[anne campbell]

whats happening in falkirk? the date was set for august 8. has it went ahead?

[Linda Doolan]

I work at Loanhead Primary School kitchen, and the girls and myself would like to know, what happened at the tribunal with Midlothian Council on 21/08/08 as our case has been going on FAR FAR to long now

[LILIAN BOW]

I WORK AT LANGLAW PRIMARY AND WE WOULD ALSO LIKE TO KNOW WHAT WENT ON AT THE MEETING ON THE 21 08 07 AS WE HAVE HAD NO IMFORMATION FOR SOME TIME

[Elaine McEleney]

What is happening with Falkirk council? How many more case managements are there?How long before it actually comes to the tribunal its self?

[pat wotherspoon/senior carer]

hi anne and elaine from falkirk there were two case hearings 3/8 and 8/8 one lasted 1 hour the other 1 hour 30 mins with no outcome our next case dates are friday 14/9 and tuesday 9/10 if you want to contact your local councillor dont bother with G.D, waste of --------

[pat wotherspoon]

to anne and elaine i didnt mean god i meant every bodys friend hope you know who this is.

[pat wotherspoon/senior carer]

falkirk council via mark irvine if there is no outcome to our next two hearings then we will keep going until there is.but it may be that something may happen outside the tribunal as with glasgow edinburgh and stirling.

[anne campbell]

pat where are you getting all the info ?i would like to know ?

[James Clark Bellshill]

Can anybody tell me what is happening with North Lanarkshire Council with regards to equal pay?

[pat wotherspoon]

hi anne got info today from mark irvine he didnt email me back so if that happens i email stefan cross and they pass it on to him i wait till after the cases have started thats 10 am then i email the tribunal office and ask if it went ahead and how long it lasted and if any outcome glasgowet@ets,gsi,gov.uk igot the latest dates from them can you say where you work anne take care pat

[j dalrymple]

can anyone tell me whats happening with Fife Council concerning the equal pay issue.

[pat wotherspoon/senior carer]

anyone above go to action4 equality website click august 9 for update on discrimination fight against the unions.

[Elaine McEleney]

Thanks Pat for all your information.You are soooo good in keeping us up to date.Would just like to say to everyone in Falkirk to start annoying all the councillors for some support and put an end to the lies and bullying tactics.Come on Falkirk PAY UP.

[pat wotherspoon/senior carer]

tickety boo elaine.

[pat wotherspoon]

anyone who gets 27 pence a mile for there petrol can claim 40 pence a mile through the inland revenue if your not already claiming this you need 5 forms p87 because its back dated to 2002 so thats 13pence for each mile you will need to hand in a letter to your wages dept,asking if they could please give you this info,we did this in falkirk but were refused even although they had already given it out they had been told no longer to give out this info.so we went into the data protection route p,7[1] and sent this to our data protection officer 2 weeks ago we have now got this info i myself am due over 1,000 pounds this is given in the form of a check you should then apply using this form every year.

[anne campbell]

hi to pat i am an ex shop steward for t&g and an ex senior i left obout 2 years ago after 18 yrs in the job

[pat wotherspoon]

hi anne ill be 25 years come march i must be mad.

[anne campbell]

hi pat i would still be in the job but something not so nice happened that i cant talk about on the net ask anybody from the grangemouth office and they might tell you anne oh where do you work?

[pat wotherspoon/]

hi anne work from falkirk brockville office for peanuts.

[Elaine McEleney]

Could anyone from Glasgow home helps let me know roughly what their settlement was worth. Is it worth waiting for? Will i be able to get a new kitchen and a holiday to Mauritious?