[26
APR 00] COVENTRY CITY COUNCIL NEWS
Single Status To Be Reconsidered
BY ANTONY HOPKER
Coventry
councillors are to pause for thought before considering what to do
with the new pay deal for council employees after union members voted
against the offer.
They
will wait until the elections are over before pressing ahead with the
plans to implement the Single Status package
Ninety
five per cent of union members voted against the changes in a ballot
last week, and more than a hundred council employees jeered at
councillors outside the council house to protest at the moves.
Union
leaders say that many of the 11,000 employees affected by the changes
will see their salary cut, in some cases by up to £5,000.
But
council leader John Fletcher said some staff might have miscalculated
the effect of the review of pay scales and job evaluation.
He
said:
“We
all need to sit down a for a little while and think through what the
implications are.
“There’s
an awful lot of misunderstanding on the part of the staff.
“A
lot have made assumptions and they’ve not quite worked out where
they are likely to be on the new pay scales.
“There
are probably significant numbers who believe they are going to be
worse off because that’s what others have told them.
“There’s
bound to be some anomalies, but they don’t realise that there’s
an appeals procedure”
Cllr
Fletcher said that some people definitely would lose out under the new
arrangements.
He
said:
“If
you are bringing in equal pay for doing the same job then some
people are bound to lose out.
“We
need to talk the unions and to the employees to find out more about
their views.
“But
one thing we cannot do is increase the overall wage bill as we would
have to reduce the amount of services available to the people of
this city.“
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