Glasgow City Council is to sack more than 23,000 members of staff and then rehire them to new contracts after pay talks broke down with unions. The local authority says letters will be sent to its non-teaching staff next week, with new contracts then taking effect from 1 January. Talks earlier this week between the council and the GMB, Unison and Unite unions fell apart on Wednesday when Unison said it would not ballot its members on a proposed new pay offer.
The negotiations concerned plans by the council to implement a new pay and grading system, to replace one that was found to discriminate against mostly women workers. However the move meant 11% of employees would see wages cut. The council said redundancy notices would be withdrawn if the three unions agreed to ballot their members on the pay offer.
The letters of dismissal will cover every member of non-teaching staff on the council's books, including chief executive Susanne Millar, nursery staff and refuse collectors. Unions called the move a "scandalous threat" and demanded it be withdrawn. Glasgow City Council at 'critical' point over £110m budget gap Glasgow City Council approves plan to cut pay for some workers Hundreds of council workers face wages cut in end to equal pay row In a statement, the council's director of communications and corporate governance Colin Edgar claimed Unison had betrayed its own members by not balloting them.
He said talks breaking down meant there was now "no agreed way forward between the council and the joint trade unions". "The council has gone as far as it can," said Edgar. "The new pay and grading scheme removes unequal pay and sees pay rise or stay the same for 90% of staff – the council's total pay bill will be substantially higher.
"For those staff who are in detriment our joint trade unions negotiated an increase in pay protection from six months to 12 months. "Additionally, some trade unions are devoting energy to local consultations to mitigate the impact on those colleagues in detriment – focussing on providing specific solutions." Edgar said council officials hoped to meet with Unison earlier but the union had not attended the meeting. He added: "The offer which has been unilaterally rejected by Unison would have taken dismissals off the table and seen additional cash for those members of staff, and members of all unions, who are due back pay.
"It beggars belief that they would betray their own members in this way." Graham McNabb, an industrial officer with Unite the Union, said: "Glasgow City Council must remove direct threats to our membership in its proposed new pay and grading structure, whether it is through cuts to terms and conditions, or the scandalous threat of fire and rehire tactics. "If they go down this reckless path then it will be met with the full force of Unite." At a meeting last month, the council agreed to an overhaul of its pay and grading structure after eight years of negotiations. The new system would see 63% of those affected gain financially while 11% will have their wages reduced.
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