A ten-year battle for equal pay moved one step closer to victory for 160 women, including cleaners, telephonists, kitchen, laundry, ward hostess staff at the Royal Victoria Hospital in Newcastle. Today’s decision by the Employment Appeal Tribunal in Armstrong v Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Trust clears the way for them to claim equal pay for work of equal value in respect to bonus payments previously only available to men at the hospital.
UNISON, the UK’s largest public sector union, first took up the women’s fight for equal pay in 2000 when it lodged claims on their behalf. Subsequently, the Trust has raised complex legal arguments at every stage, leading to a decade long legal wrangle.
When the case was first lodged, men working as porters at the Royal Victoria Infirmary in Newcastle were typically paid bonuses of around £20 a week, which the women were not entitled to claim. As the women were earning around £4.17 an hour at this time, this was a significant loss of potential earnings. UNISON challenged this distinction, arguing that the women were entitled to equal pay for work of equal value. The Trust countered the challenge with a catalogue of complex legal defences and appeals.
Bronwyn McKenna, UNISON Head of Organising and Membership Services, said:
“It has taken ten long years to get just one small step closer to equal pay for work of equal value for these women. It is a mystery to me why employers waste huge amounts of time and public money defending claims for equal pay on spurious legal grounds.
“The law surrounding equal pay is complex and open to different interpretations, so we often end up in long legal battles. It is time we had a simpler system to ensure that women get pay justice without forcing them to jump through so many legal hoops.
“UNISON is now set to take this claim forward and we hope that these low paid women will finally get the pay justice they deserve.”