Union in warning over council job cut threat
A UNION has warned of the risk of compulsory redundancies for council employees after councillors voted to cut redundancy terms.
The SNP leader of East Dunbartonshire Council has accused his Conservative and Liberal Democrat colleagues of treating council employees with “abject contempt” by announcing the decision ahead of consulting the workforce.
Councillors voted to cut the maximum added years for pensionable employees from 10 to three, reduce the maximum discretionary payments from 66 weeks to 30, and introduce a maximum payback period of two years.
The changes were passed at a recent council meeting by 10 votes to 12, with the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats in favour and other councillors against.
The vote instructs management to issue 90-day notices next March to all staff who do not agree to the changes voluntarily, terminating their current contracts and re-engaging them on the new terms and conditions.
Unison said the changes were a “train wreck” and could lead to compulsory redundancies.
Councillor Gordon Low, who heads the SNP minority administration, said: “Since the election in May, the LibDem and Tory groups have talked loftily about the importance of genuine consultation before making decisions that affect council services, even though their actions in the past have not matched that rhetoric.
“But the rhetoric has now been turned on its head when it comes to the council’s own workforce, who have been offered nothing more than a sham consultation, where the decision to impose new terms and conditions has already been made.
“As the largest employer in the area, we should lead by example, but instead to treat our employees with such abject contempt is shameful.”
He added: “While everyone recognises the financial constraints across the public sector, this represents a race to the bottom in terms of national standards on redundancy provision, motivated by an ideology that seeks to make the cost of redun- dancies as cheap as possible. It is also grossly iniquitous to place current staff in such severe detriment, compared to the packages on which former employees have been released over recent years.”
Councillor Low said the changes will have “profound implications both for the council’s relations with its workforce and for future budgetary decisions” and his party will attempt to overturn the decision.
In a letter to members, Unison convener Thomas Robertson said: “There is the real possibility that the council may need to make a £15million saving next year which could see the loss of services, and slashing the only meaningful exit strategy package prior to this saving is a train wreck waiting to happen.
“The reality of this means employees will not consider derisory voluntary exit packages in the coming years and with the threat of services being reduced or even stopped altogether, further savings will only be achieved through job cuts, if no-one volunteers then there is only one alternative, compulsory redundancies.”
The Unison convener added that the union is being treated with “contempt” and has been given “no opportunity” to negotiate the change.