Back in 1997 local government workers agreed a structure that should have seen a levelling up of pay across grades, between manual and nonmanual staff and between men and women...

Local government workers face up to their pay problems

WORKERS, FEB 2005 ISSUE

All around the country local government workers are aggrieved and in revolt against a new pay system, which is part of a single status agreement dating back to 1997.Protests vary, with groups coming out for periods of strike action like the bin workers in Coventry, widespread ballot rejections of the new pay system, lobbies, mass meetings in work time, non-cooperation and widespread protest in the local press.

A special feature of these protests is that they are directed not only against their employers but also at their unions, UNISON, GMB and TGWU, especially where the local branch and regional officials are perceived to have collaborated in the local agreement. Some members have taken legal action against their employers and union officials to recover back pay under equality legislation encouraged by no-win no-fee solicitors.

Expectation
Yet the single status agreement had been widely supported in the expectation that it would address inequalities in pay and conditions among local government workers. It was known that there were occupational groups such as care workers, mainly women, who were underpaid relative to many comparable groups. Manual workers and white collar also had different working conditions resulting from previous agreements.

Before the creation of UNISON, administrative, professional, technical and clerical (APTC) workers had been covered by the Purple Book negotiated by NALGO and the APTC section of other unions, while manual workers had agreements negotiated by NUPE, GMB and TGWU. The creation of UNISON gave impetus to harmonise pay and conditions, with the hope that many would gain from the greater unity.

Although it was accepted that not everyone would gain in every condition, the aim was to level upwards so all could enjoy the best conditions. UNISON workers, who backed the single status agreement overwhelmingly in a ballot, were not giving authority to rob some workers to pay others.

The agreement also promised improved access to training for all. Against a background of skill shortages this was seen as a great opportunity for advance for workers, which would also benefit the community.

Widespread pay cuts
What has gone so wrong to cause widespread pay cuts of thousands of pounds to men and women workers at all levels of the pay scales?

In Hull, for example, the unions gave a cautious welcome in March 2004 when the cabinet of the council agreed a 5-year pay protection for any losers in the pay evaluation exercise, although the Labour council had dropped a commitment to back pay for gainers because of budget cuts. In July 2004 when the results of the job evaluation exercise were announced there was an uproar. There were pay cuts ranging up to £12,000 a year! 90% of GMB and 98% of TGWU workers voted to reject the evaluation scheme.

By August 2004 UNISON members voted for an industrial action ballot and instructed negotiators to seek no losers, and implementation of gains for winners. Of the 7,500 in the new pay structure, 1,430 had lost, 2,800 had gained and 3,270 had remained the same. A binman had lost £5,700 out of his £17,000 salary, a GMB representative working in highways had lost £4,477 a year and council solicitors' pay was dropping by £6,000. One of the solicitors said professional staff had taken a huge drop in wages, many were leaving and being replaced by either unqualified staff or by agency staff who will be paid more.

In Coventry, the council reached the end of the third attempt at implementing the pay review in six years in September 2004. It had put in more money and a protection deal which freezes salaries for 5 years, and it was optimistic about a deal. When the results came out the workers were outraged. Many were to lose thousands of pounds.

£8,000 pay cut
Losers included binmen (who immediately walked out on strike) and school secretaries. Benefit advice workers were losing £8,000 a year and environmental offices £4,000. Noise team workers, who work night shifts and face verbal and physical abuse and had just appeared on a BBC programme that praised their work, faced losing £9,500 a year.

Among the winners were carers and dinner ladies. The council estimated 4,000 gainers, 4,000 staying the same and 2,000 losers. UNISON's branch secretary explained that there were many more losers when one took into account the loss of future grade increases in the old system to which many were entitled. The ballot results were not surprising: rejection by the membership of all three unions - by 4 to 1 in UNISON, 3 to 2 in GMB and by a few percent in TGWU. The employer, having threatened to impose the system, is back in negotiations with a new ballot expected next April.

Similar rejection has occurred in Worcester in two ballots. In this case, however, it has been accompanied by a huge drop in morale among members and a 30% loss of membership.

In Newcastle settlement was reached relatively early and an 8-year protection agreement led to acceptance by members. But the agreement did not include back pay for those workers, such as cleaners, cooks and carers, who had gained. A no-win no-fee solicitor stepped in and sued both branch officials and the council. The council has now settled out of court, and the government allowed it to use capital receipts for the back pay. Middlesbrough has been similarly sued.

Pay reviews with widespread losses to compensate for gainers like the ones described above have been typical around the country, resulting in equally widespread slowdown in progress. Only a fifth of councils have implemented the pay system seven years after the agreement, and these are mostly small authorities.

The single status agreement had been widely supported in the expectation that it would address inequalities in pay

Initial confidence
The initial confidence of branch delegates at a special conference at Crystal Palace in 1997 was based on the fact that the system required local agreement. They believed that any job evaluation scheme agreed nationally would be fair. The ballot result from the membership at large was also helped by being linked to an annual pay deal which included a cut in working hours for manual workers, bringing them into line with their APTC colleagues. But as soon as branch officers and stewards started negotiations with the employers and joint training with managers on the nationally agreed job evaluation scheme, doubts and concerns emerged.

The employers' main motivation for supporting the scheme was to avoid equal pay claims for groups of women workers such as school cooks, care workers and nursery nurses. Several cases had already established in the courts that they were underpaid compared to traditional male occupations such as ground workers or road cleaners, many of whom had the same basic pay but also earned bonuses tied to performance. It was already known that when claims were successful, not only were future costs for the services increased, but millions were needed for back pay.

The employers' plans became apparent when they stated that any changes in pay had to be cost neutral. Among workers single status became synonymous with rob Peter to pay Paula. As the first results came out it turned into robbing Pauline and Peter to pay Paula.

Attempts by union negotiators to extend bonus schemes to women workers were rejected by the employers, as were schemes that consolidated bonuses into salaries and extended this to underpaid groups.

Many union members remembered the strike by Ford women workers when they won equal pay supported by their unions and male workmates. They asked why we were not mobilising the underpaid groups with support from their fellow union members. By then the idea of membership struggle against employers had become either suspect or unattainable to many, particularly some full-time officials. The union culture had turned into that of a service union, with legal expertise and belief that European Union legislation would achieve fairness.

Huge resources were put into legal cases and appeals and any legal victory used as a recruitment tool. The GMB made it a central part of its recruitment strategy, targeting groups of workers with the promise of equal pay claims. Easy trade unionism, gain without pain on cheap subscriptions. But legal setbacks were not publicised. UNISON had won a case giving back pay to workers who had achieved equal pay. Their employer immediately privatised the service and the new employer refused to pay the back pay. UNISON took appeals all the way up to the European Court of Justice: concerned not to undermine privatisation, it backed the employers.

One of the expected advantages of the new system was transparency, but pay negotiators and stewards found it difficult to find out details of who gained and lost in concluded deals. None of the unions published results either nationally or regionally. In Solihull the negotiators had signed a confidentiality clause. News travelled by word of mouth and increasingly adverts for many jobs had a market supplement. This was an indication that the job had had a pay cut.

Market supplements
Market supplements are allowed under the national agreement, provided that they are applied to all groups where recruitment is difficult and provided they are removed as soon as the market changes. The market supplement does not contribute to pensions, saving the employers money and undermining the pension scheme. Yet it has become an important element of pay protection in negotiations, as one way to prevent the destruction of many services.

Increasingly workers questioned the fairness of the job evaluation schemes. In Sandwell, in the West Midlands, engineers volunteered to have all job levels evaluated in one team as part of a mock exercise to test the proposed computer system. They gained detailed knowledge of the scheme and found the flaws. It could not fairly evaluate all the jobs.

Further investigation showed that many councils had applied the evaluation only for the bottom parts of the pay groups where the highest risk of equal pay claims existed. Ironically these were the groups which had had a job evaluation scheme in the manual workers' pay agreement. Whenever stewards questioned the single status scheme, officials said we had a very successful job evaluation system before; what is different now?

Some councils apply the nationally agreed scheme NJC to the bottom half of the pay scale groups and the Hay scheme at the top. In London the GLPC scheme is used. Where two schemes have been used, difficulties have occurred at the meeting point.

Limitations
What is clear is that the job evaluation schemes, far from being objective tools, are either designed to produce certain outcomes or have limitations which prevent their fair use for all pay groups. In complex situations like a large metropolitan council, where typically between 2,000 and 3,000 job types are required, the problems are predictable.

Different schemes may deliver different outcomes, so the choice of scheme is actually very important. For example Hay is likely to compress salaries at the bottom and stretch those at the top. The GLPC scheme can be expected to deliver similar outcomes to the NJC but may undervalue front-line jobs, which have responsibility for people and put emotional demands on the workers.

When challenged on the unfair effects on groups like engineers, bin workers, solicitors, librarians, ground workers, and many others, a national UNISON officer said that pay hierarchies had to change, and that society had undervalued women's jobs and overvalued male jobs. The NJC scheme has been designed by "expert" consultants; it cannot be challenged by members.

One union, two pay systems
A question increasingly asked by UNISON members is this: Why has Agenda For Change in the health service delivered such a different outcome and pay schemes when workers in both are organised by the same union? There is at the very top a liaison committee on service conditions to exchange knowledge and experience, but it has had no effect.

The NHS job evaluation scheme measures skills and knowledge much more fairly. Undoubtedly the employers are wary of the effects of undervaluing skilled and professional health workers at a time when so much political importance is placed on improvements in the health service. Also, a pilot scheme enabled any errors to be corrected. Administrative jobs had low outcomes, so the scheme is being looked at again to identify where the real content of the job is being undervalued.

Most importantly, Agenda for Change is much better funded, using the money that has gone into the NHS from central government. The obvious difference has not been lost on local government workers. Increasingly at negotiations the question asked of the employers is, How much money are you putting into the single status agreement?

Equal pay will be achieved and it will be paid by those who underpaid our fellow workers for years - the employers. We will not allow them to rob one group of our members to subsidise the pay of others.

The latest pay settlement (2004-6) has made completion of job evaluation and new pay structures an employers' condition: if it is not completed by the deadlines, the 3rd-year pay increase could be stopped by the employers. Faced with non-cooperation and resistance from members and their branch representatives, the employers increasingly threaten to carry out the evaluation without the involvement of the unions or the holders of the jobs being assessed and then to impose the new pay scheme. This has galvanised the membership. Avoiding the problem is no longer an option.

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