UNISON Northwest

17/08/2009

Bury Council's Decision to Appeal is a Discrace

Bury Council's decision to appeal against the recent findings by the Tribunal in respect of Equal Pay is a disgrace says UNISON who are the main union representing the women with Equal Pay claims.

1,200 low paid women - including cleaners, support workers and cooks - stood to gain thousands of pounds each after UNISON fought and won an equal pay claim against Bury Metropolitan Borough Council.

Frank Hont, UNISON NW Regional Secretary said "On the day the Council revealed that they have already spent over £600,000 on legal costs, the news that they now plan to waste even more Council Tax payers money by appealing against the decision is nothing short of a disgrace."

While the legal process drags out low paid women members will have to wait even longer for what the Employment Tribunal has already ruled is rightfully theirs.

The Council has wasted £600,000 in an effort to save millions of pounds which it owes to its female staff when it could have asked the Government to release funding for this through the Capitalisation process. It now looks like it is prepared spend a further million pounds to continue its failed defence.

The situation in Bury echoes that in Cumbria County Council where the County Council funded legal arguments at great expense for over 7 years and now finds itself allocating 39 million pounds to settle the claims of its women employees.

UNISON will now have to consider whether to itself appeal against the part of the Employment Tribunal ruling which went against the women claimants, so it could be that the affect of this decision will be to increase the overall costs of this affair to Bury Council.

Even at this late stage we call on Elected Members of Bury Council to reconsider their position and approach UNISON with sensible proposals to settle our members' claims.

News

Bury Council's Decision to Appeal is a Discrace