| UNISON City of Edinburgh Branch |
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Statement on press reports that Council is to challenge arbitration UNISON is disappointed that Council officials appear to be challenging the arbitration decision in the City of Edinburgh Council janitors dispute. UNISON entered into binding arbitration in good faith with the Council. Both sides accepted that they would be bound by the result. To question the result or to attempt to cast doubt on the integrity of the process would be a disgrace. UNISON has stated time after time that we would be bound by arbitration. We first asked for this in January 2000. The Council eventually agreed after 6 days of strike action last Christmas - Not during the action as has been claimed. Failure to abide by the arbitration would be an act of bad faith and would lead our members to question Council officials' motives in going to arbitration. More seriously, if officials renege on arbitration, it would undermine it as a way of avoiding disputes or settling disputes in the future. After the unfair attacks on UNISON last Christmas, we would hope that the public will now see the problems they faced in dealing with the Council. 19 February 2002 Edinburgh jannies win Edinburgh janitors have been vindicated in their campaign to reinstate a nationally agreed irregular hours payment. An arbitration decisions has found in favour of the UNISON case. Members are delighted with the resilt but angry that it took a two year campaign and six days of strike action before the council agreed to arbitration. See here for the full press release. More details to follow. 20 December 2001 City of Edinburgh Council Janitorial Dispute - Joint Statement "Following conciliation under the auspices of ACAS at Franborough House on Thursday 20 December 2001 both sides have agreed to refer the issue to arbitration. There will be no further press comment by either side on this matter." NOTE: The Branch is sending an explanatory letter to all affected janitorial members. 14 December 2001 Talks hope as janitors leave window of opportunity Hopes of talks between janitors' unions and the City of Edinburgh Council were raised today as janitors left a 'window of opportunity' before any escalation of their strike action. "We now hope talks can go ahead at ACAS next Thursday (20 December)", said UNISON branch secretary John Stevenson. "Janitors are prepared to escalate their action but have agreed to leave room for talks. If progress is being made, there may even be an opportunity to suspend future strikes to allow talks to develop". However UNISON and T&G officials warned that janitors were ready to increase their strike action if needed. 130 janitors in 67 primary schools, 18 community centres, a miscellaneous centre and one secondary school have taken two three-day blocks of strike action over the last two weeks. They exempted special schools and also decided not to strike in the last week of term to avoid disrupting end of term activities. The dispute dates from 1999 and concerns irregular hours payments to recognise the 6am to 6pm day. The nationally agreed payments can amount to £20 a week but have not been paid by the Council following a janitorial review. 11 December 2001 Correction to Evening News leader Article 11 December 2001 UNISON City of Edinburgh Branch has issued the following statement regarding an incorrect statement in the Edinburgh Evening News leader article on 11 December 2001. The leader erroneously says "The education department has already offered to allow independent assessors to judge the merits of the case, but for reasons known only to themselves, union officials have rejected this out of hand". It further states "Unison should agree to let this dispute go to arbitration..." UNISON has clarified the position as follows: "There has been no offer from the Council to go to independent assessors to judge the case. "The Cocunil offered to use ACAS for consiliation (ie talks about talks) on Thursday 6 December but only if the industrial action was suspended. UNISON offered to have unconditional talks at ACAS or directly with the Council on any day between Friday 7 December and Tuesday 11 december when the next strike was due. The Council refused. "UNISON is in fact the only party to have offered to go to independent assessors. - in autumn 2000 UNISON offered to refer the dispute to Local Government staff and employers own independent assessors (the 'Joint Secretaries') and we offered to accept the result as binding. The Council refused. - UNISON then requested that the matter be referred to ACAS and the Council refused. "Given that the Council announced to the press that UNISON had rejecetd ACAS approaches when it knew ACAS had not yet approached the union, and given that the Council has said UNISON rejected talks when in fact we did not, the union can only assume that the City of Edinburgh Council's approach to ACAS was not genuine and was intended to mislead the public. 10 December 2001 Strikes go ahead as Council refuses talks Edinburgh Janitors will strike again as planned this week on 11, 12 and 13 December. The union had hoped that talks could begin at the Arbitration and Conciliation Service but after five days of to-ing and fro-ing the Council has refused to meet unless the strike action was lifted. The union had to think very carefully about this, especially since any suspension of action could create a legeal problem if strikes had to start again. It also had to assess whether the City of Edinburgh Council was making a serious approach, or whether this was just a manoevre to get the strike halted. UNISON offered, via ACAS, to meet the Council anywhere between 7 and 10 December, with no conditions, to attempt to avoid the next round of strikes. This was against a background of:-
Janitors now fear that the timing of the Council's apparent offer, the conditions without any indication that these would be constructive talks and the unwillingness to talk on the four days between the strikes all means that the Council's offer of talks was not a serious attempt to break the deadlock - merely a tactic to undermine the dispute. 6 December 2001 Janitors consider ACAS approach despite council provocation UNISON's Edinburgh Branch is considering an approach by Arbitration and Conciliation Service (ACAS) for conciliation in the Janitors' dispute, but the branch has slammed Council statements which the union says were 'designed to mislead the public'. "The Council claimed in the press that it had not received a response from UNISON, when it knew well that neither the Council nor ACAS had yet approached UNISON with the proposal", said UNISON Branch Secretary John Stevenson. "This has angered Janitors and was hardly the kind of move which would help resolve the dispute. This dispute will be resolved by serious talks, not cheap media tricks". "If the Council is really serious about conciliation, why did it not agree to our approach months ago? Why did it not agree to this before the strike, and why are they only suggesting this halfway into the strikes? These are the questions that have made janitors deeply suspicious of the Council's motives", added Mr Stevenson. "Nevertheless, we need to let ACAS do its job. We are prepared to talk without conditions. We have already been talking with ACAS throughout today and will continue to do so. We are hopeful that something can be achieved in the four days remaining before further strike action. We are serious about talks, we hope the Council is too". 3 December 2001 UNISON says stubborn council has picked fight with janitors UNISON says council stubbornness has led to the Edinburgh janitors' strike which will disrupt schools this week. It also claims the council has picked a fight with janitors when at least three options were presented by the union for a solution. "We have done all in our power to try to reach a settlement over the last two and half years", said George Lee, Edinburgh UNISON Manual Convenor. "Firstly we negotiated a deal in good faith which supplements the national agreement but now the council says is instead of the national agreement. " - then we offered to accept a binding ruling from the joint secretaries of management and unions at CoSLA. The council refused. " - we offered to go to ACAS. The council refused. " - we offered to change hours so janitors would no longer qualify for the nationally agreed payment. The council refused", added Mr Lee. UNISON Edinburgh Branch Secretary John Stevenson said, "If the council is so sure that janitors were 'never eligible' for the payment, why are they so afraid to go to independent arbitration? Instead they seem determined to create conflict in our schools". "It would be a tragedy if the council has decided to wait and see if the strike is effective before they talk seriously. If that is the case, I can imagine parents will be less than happy with that tactic", he added.
29 November 2001 Edinburgh spurns unions' offer to avert Janitors' strike The strike by Edinburgh's janitors, members of UNISON and the Transport & General Workers Union, will go ahead on 4, 5, 6, 11, 12 and 13 December after The City of Edinburgh Council spurned a union offer that could have settled the irregular hours payments dispute meantime. "The unions asked for talks yesterday to try to prevent the strike. The Council did meet with us but were not prepared to move", said George Lee UNISON Manual Convenor. "To try to find some way through the impasse, we offered to go back to Janitors working 7.30am to 6pm instead of 6am to 6pm, keeping the national agreement but taking the irregular hours dispute out of the equation. But the Council were not prepared to budge." "Worse still, the Council risked escalating the dispute by suggesting it might unilaterally pull out of the whole janitorial deal, affecting not only the staff in dispute but all of the secondary school janitors too", added George. "We regret this action but we want the public to understand we have been trying to resolve this with the Council since May 1999", said Pat Rafferty, T&G full time officer. The unions have tried to minimise effects on the public by:- giving as early notice as possible of the action
exempting all of the special schools from the action taking no
action in the last week of term to avoid disrupting most pantomimes
and other events children will have been planning for.
"All janitors want is the same as their colleagues in secondary schools. Currently they are up to £20 a week worse off because the Council will not pay a nationally agreed irregular hours payment to recognise the long 6am to 6pm day." said John Stevenson, UNISON Branch Secretary. The initial six day strikes involving 140 staff will affect 67 primary schools, 18 Community Education Centres, Dr Bells and one secondary school. 29 November 2001 UNISON warns public before last minute bid to avoid Edinburgh janitor's strike UNISON's Edinburgh Branch is to offer City of Edinburgh Council the chance of last minute talks to avoid a janitor's strike planned for 3, 4, 5 December and 11, 12, 13 December. "While we would like to solve this dispute and avoid the strike, we also have to be realistic and make sure parents know when the strike is planned for so they can make other arrangements. We want to avoid parents getting late notice from the Council, which has been a problem before", said George Lee, the branch's manual convenor. "Because janitors jobs are so crucial to the school team, the public is bound to be affected. Janitors are responsible for fire alarms, heating, fire escapes, oversee cleaning and ensure safe playgrounds etc, and we expect schools will close on safety grounds. But we have taken other measures to try to stave off the worst effects", said John Stevenson UNISON Edinburgh Branch Secretary. These measures include:
"We regret this action but we want the public to understand we have been trying to resolve this with the Council since May 1999. All janitors want is the same as their colleagues in secondary schools. Currently they are up to £20 a week worse off because the Council will not pay a nationally agreed irregular hours payment to recognise the long 6am to 6pm day. This is cheaper than the overtime they would have to pay for janitors coming in at 6am, but they are not even paying that. They can't have it both ways", added George Lee. The initial six day strikes involving 103 staff will affect 67 primary schools, 18 Community Education Centres, Dr Bells and one secondary school. |