The pay claim put forward this year on
behalf of 1.25 million UNISON, Amicus, TGWU
and GMB members working for local councils could be a significant
challenge to the Labour Government.
Essentially the bid is for 5% or £1,000 – whichever is the greater – and
with an underpinning minimum of £6.30p per hour. Quite rightly this ignores the Government's
"preferred" measure of inflation which stands at 3%, and looks instead
at the "old" Retail Prices Index (RPI) which has just topped
4.4%. Currently minimum pay in local
government is £5.80.
With Gordon Brown signalling that he wants
public sector pay capped at 2% for the next 5 years a serious fight for this
claim will be a real challenge to the Government. It will also leave loyalties divided at the
head of UNISON, and perhaps other unions, where there is clearly an undeclared
campaign to support Brown for Leader of the Labour Party.
The most surprising aspect of the claim is
the addition to the claim of a number of service conditions improvements: an
additional day's leave, a 35 hour week, a major improvement in night pay (from
time plus one third to double-time) and a near doubling of the
"sleep-in" allowance to £60. In
one sense these are welcome if the union leaderships are serious about fighting
for them. The pay claim put
forward this year on behalf of 1.25 million UNISON, Amicus, TGWU and GMB members working for local councils
could be a significant challenge to the Labour Government. The claim includes a number of service
conditions improvements: an additional day's leave, a 35 hour week, a major
improvement in night pay and a near
doubling of the "sleep-in" allowance to £60.
However, with these terms and
conditions varying considerably from council to council they can be a
distraction which fail to unite the membership.
For example, most staff in metropolitan areas already have a 35 hour
week, while the night pay bid might be seen as making council provided services
"uncompetitive" at a time when the private and voluntary sector often
pay no night enhancements.
Particularly in UNISON, most Local
Government Branches are currently engaged in major fights over the introduction
of Single Status, and the TUC wide campaign against privatisation of public
services. They are also still fighting
to overturn cuts in the current pension scheme – the removal of the Rule of 85
– and to ensure the new pension scheme is acceptable. In these circumstances it will not be
surprising if the headline rate of the pay settlement is the only thing that
members concentrate upon. However,
growing anger over all these issues is likely to explode in some direction,
with the prospect of a ballot for another massive strike across England and Wales certainly on the cards.
