| UNISON City of Edinburgh Branch |
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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. ENDS Further Information |
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