THE Government yesterday failed its first major test in its bid to introduce union recognition and a national minimum wage in Scotland.
The country's biggest teaching union, the Educational Institute of Scotland, said the Government's White Paper, Fairness at Work, did not go far enough and failed to address the needs of more than five million workers employed in small businesses.
The union, which represents almost 50,000 teachers and college lecturers, called on the Government to rethink its insistence that union organisation in the workplace would require the support of at least 40% of employees.
It also called on the President of the Board of Trade, Margaret Beckett, to reject the Low Pay Commission's recommendation for a minimum wage of #3.60 per hour in favour of a more realistic level of #4.60.
Delegates to the union's annual conference in Dundee also backed a call to establish a campaign to outlaw waiver clauses in tem-porary contracts. Such clauses, used routinely in higher education, require workers on fixed term contracts to waive their rights to unfair dismissal and statutory redundancy payments.
Delegates also agreed to campaign to stop the abuse of zero hour contracts used to exploit young people and students working in the fast food industry. They agreed to press the Government to introduce the European Social Charter in its entirety.
Union vice president John Patton - who moved the emergency motion calling for the revised package of measures - said the White Paper included a number of measures which teachers could recognise as family-friendly, such as a national childcare strategy, flexible working hours, working families tax credit and improved maternity leave provision.
He said that on the issue of collective rights it was appropriate that workers should have the right to trade union recognition. But he added: ''Along with others in the trade union movement, we are not supportive of the 40% threshold that has been set. It is a fundamental breach of workers' rights, is palpably unjust and probably a serious political misjudgment. We will campaign vigorously through the TUC and the STUC to change that position.''
Mr Patton welcomed proposals to outlaw discrimination on the grounds of workers' trade union membership and other forms of blacklisting. He also applauded the Government's attempts to reform the law on industrial action ballots to make them less complicated.
He said: ''We will continue to press the Government to adopt the STUC proposal for a national minimum wage of #4.60 for all categories and age groups of workers. However, I believe that as trade unionists we have a duty to recognise and welcome the thrust of this White Paper as a first step in the dismantling of the unjust, oppressive and frequently inefficient industrial and employment law imposed on the workers of this country during the 1980s.''
Glasgow teacher Jock Morris said teachers had been disappointed with the Labour Government's broken promises in the past.
Mr Morris said: ''On this particular occasion, it looks like we are going to be even more disappointed than we have been in the past.''
He added that the Government was pursuing a so-called third way in politics.
''There's no third way. Tony Blair is taking us down an extremely right wing and anti-trade union road,'' he said.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article