Council pay dispute talks resume

Council workers want a 6% pay rise

Talks aimed at resolving the pay dispute by council workers in England, Wales and Northern Ireland are continuing at the conciliation service, Acas.

A new pay offer from employers to the unions is reported to have been put on the table at Friday's meeting, but details of it have yet to emerge.

Unions say the talks are the last chance to reach a settlement and avoid a summer of strike action and disrupted council services.

If there is no just settlement, then the second national strike will go ahead on 14 August

Jack Dromey
Union negotiator

Employers first offered 3%, but the unions want double this figure.

Up to one million staff went on 24-hour strike last month and a further walk-out is scheduled for 14 August.

Talks held at Acas last week ended with unions suggesting that employers had reneged on a deal to offer a £5 minimum wage.

It is expected Friday's talks could see employers reinstating the minimum wage alongside the 3% pay offer.

Some full-time staff earn less than £10,000

The BBC's local government correspondent, John Andrew, thinks either a two- or three-year pay deal is likely to be put on the table.

Similar schemes have been offered to teachers and health workers.

Councils are not thought to be under government pressure to plump for a three-year deal but such an agreement would be convenient to both them and ministers.

Some of the workers involved in the pay dispute earn less than £10,000 a year in full-time posts.

They say they have seen their responsibilities increase, while pay has effectively stood still.

Wages 'scandal'

Local authority employers say the unions' claim for a pay rise of 6% is equivalent to £80 a year on council tax bills and is therefore unaffordable without substantial job losses and cuts in services.

But Jack Dromey, from the Transport and General Workers Union, said it was time to end the "scandal" of low pay for council workers.

"The public understand this simple truth ... that how we treat public servants is vital to the quality of the service they provide to the community," Mr Dromey told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

Under current pay levels, home carers were stopping their work with the elderly and the vulnerable because they could earn more stacking supermarket shelves, he said.

"Today is the last chance to reach a just negotiated settlement.

"If there is no just settlement, then the second national strike will go ahead on 14 August.

Spending risks

"That will then be followed by selective action with key groups of workers out indefinitely, targeting council revenue."

Popular moves, such as a strike of traffic wardens, were also likely ahead of a third national strike in September.

Conservative MP Michael Fallon, a member of the Commons Treasury select committee, said extra public service investment risked being spent simply on wages.

"The unions can smell money and they are pretty good at going after their nose," Mr Fallon told Today.