By Bill Heaney
West Dunbartonshire Council is attempting to embarrass, stigmatise and make home care workers feel guilty for asking for fair pay for the work they do looking after vulnerable, housebound, elderly people in the community.
The workers, who have withdrawn their labour, met today (Wednesday) outside West Dunbartonshire Council’s Church Street, Dumbarton, headquarters.
This was to draw public attention to their dismay with the local authority’s intransigence when it comes to meeting their claim for equal pay with their male colleagues.
The women have been urged to ensure they are not made scapegoats for the dire financial position councils currently find themselves in.
And to fend off accusations that it is their demands that are to blame for the swingeing, across-the-board budget cuts being imposed on the public by local authorities.
The care workers braved the rain to join the mass walkout before travelling into Glasgow to George Square to underscore with colleagues from other council areas how strongly they feel about the unfair position they have been placed in.
These low-paid women have rejected internal reviews of their pay grades, arguing that their responsibilities have significantly increased in recent months and years.
GMB Scotland maintains that the women’s roles have been undervalued compared with similar work done by male colleagues.
The joint rally saw workers carrying colourful flags, posters and banners, demanding an immediate resolution to the dispute.
The GMB has warned that it would be a straightfoward matter for higher pay grades to be retrospectively introduced, with workers claiming up to five years’ back pay – and effectively bankrupting some councils.
Louise Gilmour, the GMB’s Scottish secretary, pictured right, said the affected women are being “guilted” into believing they are being “greedy” if councils claim essential services will lost because of pay increases.
That they are using the plight of old and vulnerable people being left alone when they would normally have a carer as a means of pulling at care workerts’ heart strings.
She said: “We know local authorities are struggling to make ends meet and we know why.
“But to suggest women workers are somehow making things worse by asking for money they are owed, and in many cases have been owed for years, is as dishonest as it is disgraceful.
“To blame equal pay claims instead of the system for pay discrimination that has prevailed in our councils is scapegoating workers only asking for what they are owed.
“It is an attempt to guilt women into believing they are being greedy and risking men’s jobs by simply asking for what they are due and have been due for years and years.
“The cost of settling equal pay issues is looming over Scotland’s local councils but is not about women – it is about fairness and has been too long in coming.”
GMB Scotland already has equal pay campaigns under way in Dundee, Perth and Kinross, Angus, Fife and Moray Councils, with a process expected to lead to pay reviews in more than a dozen other local authorities across Scotland.
Glasgow City Council has placed into hock multiple assets, including Kelvingrove Art Gallery and the City Chambers, to settle an initial £770 million equal pay bill.
A spokesperson for West Dunbartonshire Health and Social Care Partnership said those receiving home care could expect disruption to the service during the strike.
They refuse to speak to The Democrat who have been banned from contacting them even by e mail because we don’t publish the truth of what is happening in Church Street and elsewhere.
They have trumped up an excuse that we are not registered with a regulatory board which replaced the not fit for purpose now and efunct Press Council. There is no legal requirement for us to do so. We claim we are being victimised and discriminated against.
The HSCP, which includes unelected members and was imposed on the council by the SNP government, told one journalist: “We are committed to fair pay for home carers and following a thorough and robust job evaluation process the pay of a typical home carer has recently risen by at least £2,500 per annum through regrading of the role.
“We continue to work with trade union representatives and while we expect disruption to our service this industrial action, we are doing all we can to minimise this for service users.”