Today we are ensconsed in the Council House whilst outside a large crowd of union members are holding a rally designed to persuade us that we should change course on the Single Status and Pay & Regrading exercise.
There have been a lot of lies put about by union leaders on this. One on tv said this morning that this is a costcutting exercise. As we have to borrow £200m to finance this and it is going to cost an extra £23m a year for several years it would appear that we are not very good at costcutting.
Of course a lot of employees are on such high salaries that they can easily afford a days pay. If they had to work outside the public forum they would find it much more difficult and a days pay would mean a lot more to them.
Let me give an example, an officer in a senior position was told she would lose several thousand pounds a year. Despite her salary being protected for 3 years she decided to seek employment elsewhere.
She discovered that to get a similar package at another authority she had to apply for a position much higher than her present grade. Thankfully she obtained a higher rated job at another council but this demonstrates how we have been paying over the odds for many years.
Of course we have also been underpaying some jobs and this has to be rectified.
Sir Albert Bore and some of his minions are with the crowd but it is a pity no-one has the courage to ask him why he did nothing for 61/2 years after the Labour administration and the trade unions signed the agreement which set this all in train.
