Scottish councils to offer new pay deal to staff as strike action nears
Strike-threatened councils make new staff pay offer
Prototype source, Getty Images
Reject workers are due to strike with dates due to be appear for schoolhouse staff action
Scottish council leaders take fabricated a new pay offer to staff in a bid to avoid planned strikes.
Cosla has put a 3.5% deal on the tabular array after a two% increase was rejected, and will heighten the Scottish local authorities living wage to £10.50 an hour.
Unions said the offering was not enough.
Local authorities government minister Shona Robison said it was "extremely disappointing" that Cosla had not come up with v%.
The Scottish government has said it expected local authorities to match the £140m extra pledged by the Scottish government for pay rises.
Ms Robison said: "Cosla recognised this was not an issue for the Scottish government to solve in its entirety - it has got to exist a partnership.
"Which ways local authorities must look at every possible area of finance to come to a fair and affordable pay offer for staff which avoids damaging industrial action."
Earlier, GMB Scotland and Unison appear that local authority employees across the country would strike in two 4-twenty-four hours stoppages over the next calendar month in the ongoing pay dispute.
Waste and recycling workers will walk out between August 26 and 29 besides as between September 7 and x.
Prototype source, Getty Images
Refuse workers in Glasgow last took strike action in Nov 2021
GMB members will strike in Aberdeen, Angus, Dundee, East Ayrshire, East Lothian, Falkirk, Glasgow, Inverclyde, Highland, Midlothian, Orkney, South Ayrshire, South Lanarkshire, Due west Lothian, Perth and Kinross, and North Lanarkshire.
Unison members in Aberdeenshire, Clackmannanshire, East Renfrewshire, Glasgow, Inverclyde, North Lanarkshire, Stirling and Southward Lanarkshire have too said they will walk out.
Following a special meeting of quango leaders on Fri, Cosla spokeswoman Katie Hagmann said she had been mandated to make a fresh offering.
She said council leaders had reaffirmed their desire to brand an offer of more 2% merely that fears had been expressed that public services and jobs would be affected as a result.
Ms Hagmann said: "Following the confirmation that the additional monies provided by the Scottish government will be recurring, leaders take at present mandated me today to move forwards with our trade union partners on the basis of an offer that raises the Scottish local regime living wage to £10.l.
"Leaders note the risk that public services will not recover, jobs volition be affected and communities will meet services reduced as local government budgets are unable to sustain the long-term pressures they have been nether.
"Leaders continue to call on Scottish government to provide funding and flexibilities to enable an offer beyond the monies provided to engagement.
"As such, we will be seeking to make an improved offer via the appropriate negotiating mechanisms as soon as possible."
'Strong financial settlement'
The Scottish government'southward finance secretary John Swinney had earlier urged councils to improve their offer to staff and unions.
Mr Swinney told BBC Radio'south Skilful Morn Scotland programme he wanted to avoid industrial action.
He said some councils had already budgeted on a higher pay offering than the one on the table.
"Some accept budgeted on iii% and accept offered 2%. I have put £140m on tabular array which puts the offer even higher," he said.
No council leader believes staff merely deserve a iii.v% pay rise. The problem is what they can each afford.
Council pay is consequent across all 32 of Scotland'due south local authorities. The ascent has to exist affordable to all of them.
The Scottish government is giving councils an extra £140m To help with pay.
This was plenty to raise the pay offering from 2% to 3.5% but the Scottish government was clear that councils had to use more of their own money likewise.
Some councils, including Glasgow, were prepared to do this. Glasgow had argued for a 5% pay rise.
Some others argued they could non afford any more and so would need even more cash from the Scottish government.
Mr Swinney said that according to the Scottish Financial Committee, the Scottish government'south overall budget was cut in real terms by the UK government and that within that budget, councils were given a "strong fiscal settlement".
The U.k. regime says Scotland has been granted tape funding levels.
Leader of Eastward Renfrewshire Council, Owen O'Donnell, told BBC Scotland it would exist difficult to avert strikes unless Mr Swinney offered more greenbacks to councils to pay for salary rises.
He said: "He needs to double the amount he previously offered at least.
"Councils are nether a huge amount of pressure. We accept been squeezed for the past xv years and we have got nothing else to give."
It comes a day after the Scottish regime announced an emergency upkeep review for Scotland in response to the growing cost of living crisis.
'No suspension of strikes'
Johanna Baxter, Unison Scotland's caput of local authorities said: "Unison are shocked and disappointed that Cosla leaders accept yet once again failed to come up up with a decent pay offering for these vital workers.
"An offer of 3.5% is probable to be totally unacceptable to our reps and is some way off matching the offering made to council workers south of the edge.
"Whilst our local government committee volition come across next week to take a view on this there will be no pause to our strike action at this stage."
GMB Scotland senior organiser Keir Greenaway said: "This is a dire response to the cost of living crisis facing our members.
"The arraign game between Cosla and the government will no doubt keep, just six months on from the overwhelming rejection of the initial pay offer, this is a damning indictment of how our council workers are valued by Scotland's political leaders."
Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-62493167#:~:text=Scottish%20council%20leaders%20have%20made,to%20%C2%A310.50%20an%20hour.
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