A union has furiously hit back at the council leader and urged him to “look in the mirror” after he accused them of misleading workers.
David Scott, of GMB, says it is Jonathan McColl who has misled West Dunbartonshire Council staff in a row over backpay.
Some workers will need to wait until February to receive their backpay, which dates back to January 2021, after unions thrashed out a pay deal with COSLA five weeks ago.
The council admitted in December that it was unable to pay out the cash before Christmas – with GMB saying this forced the lowest paid council staff to take out payday loans.
During a council meeting two weeks ago SNP leader Jonathan McColl criticised unions and said they had “falsely raised” staff expectations.
He said it was “impossible” for West Dunbartonshire and most other councils to achieve this ambitious ask.
But David hit back, saying the council leader shouldn’t have agreed to the pay deal if that was the case.
The GMP convenor said the wording of the deal said “best endeavours” would be made to square up workers before Christmas, commenting: “If as Jonathan outlines it should have said “best endeavours” but “unlikely”, it is clear that he misled the workforce and he should never have agreed to the wording of the offer.
“It is not unreasonable for workers who should have had their pay rise in place for April 1 to expect their employer to make every effort including looking at interim payments to get their pay rise paid to them as soon as possible.
“There were no timeframes agreed nationally for payment beyond the wording in the offer.
“When it comes to failures in communication and disingenuously raising the expectation of the workforce then council leaders are the ones that need to have a look in the mirror.
“GMB remain frustrated that other larger councils have managed to pay out the backdated money to their hard working employees who have worked tirelessly during the current pandemic.”
More than 55 percent of local government workers earn below £25,000 per annum and the flat rate increase of approximately £1,062 is the highest single uplift in a one-year settlement for the lowest paid that has been achieved.
The council says it is trying to process the work involved as quickly as possible but that it involves complex sums for each worker.
Responding to the comments, Councillor McColl said: “My motion stated that councils agreed to make ‘best endeavours’ to pay out the money in December, but the context of that agreement includes lengthy discussions with trades unions nationally about how unlikely that would be, and agreement that this was as far as we were able to go in the final wording given how unlikely it was.
“What appears to have happened is that GMB locally have taken ‘best endeavours’ from the text of the agreement and translated that into telling West Dunbartonshire staff they would definitely be paid, raising expectations and causing disappointment; no other trade union did this and no other local GMB branch did this in any other Scottish council.
“Twisting my words to distract from the misinformation they gave their members is the stuff of primary school playgrounds.
“GMB must also stop suggesting that the council hasn’t made best endeavours to pay the money out as quickly as possible.
“In doing so they are continuing to attack council staff, many of whom are no doubt trade union members.
“I can tell you with confidence that they have been working as hard and as fast as they can, and this continued unwarranted criticism of staff from West Dunbartonshire GMB is unacceptable.”
