UNISON has slammed a decision by the Local Government Employers to deny a pay offer to 1.6 million local government and school support workers.
Unions – led by UNISON, the UK’s largest public service union – were due to meet the Local Government Employers today to receive a response to their pay claim for a £1.20 an hour increase.
This increase would give the Living Wage to 500,000 workers who currently earn less than the current rate of £7.65 pence an hour. It would start to restore the 18% real terms decline in pay faced by school and council workers since the Coalition took office in 2010.
The Local Government Employers are claiming they will not make an offer until the Government announces the new National Minimum Wage rate, expected in May. The National Minimum Wage is currently £6.31 an hour, just 14 pence below the lowest pay rate of £6.45 for workers covered by the National Joint Council for Local Government Services (NJC).
Heather Wakefield, UNISON Head of Local Government, said:
“The employers’ attitude to our members providing vital local services and supporting children in schools has reached an all-time low.
“Using the National Minimum Wage as an explicit benchmark for our members’ pay for the first time ever, shows just how little the employers and the Government value their amazing contribution to local communities and children in schools. It also shows their disdain for women workers who make up more than three quarters of the workforce.
“School support staff, library assistants, care workers, clerical assistants and cleaners now find themselves regarded as the lowest skilled and lowest valued in the labour market. It’s a shameful culmination of years of neglect of workers who keep our communities clean and safe, care for our elderly and help our children learn.
“This shoddy treatment has to end once and for all. The Government needs to put its money where its mouth is, end low pay in schools and councils and stop the unnecessary cuts to council funding.”
On top of an 18% decline in basic pay, local government workers have faced many additional cuts to pay-related conditions at local level, including unsocial hours payments, hours of work, annual leave, sick pay and even maternity pay. Car allowances have been frozen for three years, leaving social workers and home care workers to subsidise their employers in order to do their jobs. 55% of the cost of a £1.20 an hour pay increase would pay for itself through increased tax and National Insurance ‘take’, which could be recycled to councils and schools.
ends
Notes to Editors:
UNISON’s local government committee will meet on 18 February to decide the next steps.
The Government is likely to announce the new rate for the National Minimum Wage before the local elections in May. Local government and school employees are due a pay increase on 1 April.
