With today’s news about the interim payment of the 2008 pay offer to local government workers in England, Wales and Northern Ireland coming hot on the heels of the request that UNISON branches consult our members about the 2009 pay claim, I begin to feel that local government pay rises could become like buses. You wait ages for one to come along and then two arrive at once.
After all, the reason why we are welcoming the interim payment of a pay offer against which we took strike action, more than six months after it was due, is that we don’t know how long it will be before we get the outcome of the award from the arbitrators to whom we decided to refer the claim. By the time we have settled the 2008 pay claim it will be time to be considering how to fight for fair pay in 2009.
So, as well as considering what the pay claim for 2009 ought to be, the time is right now to start thinking about the strengths and weaknesses of what we have done in 2008 – and how we might do better in future. And I’ll blog about that just as soon as I have worked out what to spend my 2.45% on…
No comments:
Post a Comment