Scotland’s Finance Secretary has said there “simply is no more money” to fund pay deals for local government workers amid strikes which have closed schools in John Swinney’s constituency.
Trade union Unison called the action targeting the First Minister’s seat over the next two weeks after members working in non-teaching roles in schools rejected a pay offer from local authority body Cosla.
The deal would have increased pay by 67p an hour or 3.6%, whichever was higher, and was accepted by GMB and Unite, and council leaders voted to impose the increase on staff.
Finance Secretary Shona Robison said she takes the strike “incredibly seriously” because of the impact it is having on parents and children, but said the industrial action is “in no-one’s interests”.
She told BBC Radio Scotland’s Good Morning Scotland programme: “I would certainly encourage dialogue to continue between Cosla and Unison.
“A solution has to be found, but that cannot be a solution based on more money this year, because there simply is no more money available this year.
“So the solution, I think, is really looking forward to the next year and beyond, and the potential for multi-year deals between local government and their unions.
“But I have to be clear, the result of this industrial action and all of the disruption will not be more money, because there simply is none.”
Ms Robison said “difficult decisions” had to be taken to provide the money that is already on the table.
She said: “I went to Parliament to set out the difficult decisions that we have had to take in order to make sure that we are able to support this pay deal, £78 million that we’ve provided. Local government has worked hard to provide resources as well.”
In a statement published on its website, Perth and Kinross Council said all primary schools, nurseries, intensive support settings and two secondary schools will be closed on Monday.
Stuart Hope, Unison branch secretary in Perth and Kinross, said it was a “very difficult decision” to close the schools but that members feel they have had enough.
He told BBC Radio Scotland: “Our members are kind of speaking in force these next couple of weeks to say that they feel undervalued and they feel underpaid.”
He added: “They deserve better deals. They deserve better pay and they deserve to be more valued by the Scottish Government.”
He also warned that strike action could spread to every council in Scotland if a resolution is not reached.
“We have 17 other mandates in place across Scotland, then also preparation under way for an all-member ballot,” he said.
“So that would be every council worker, local government council worker and Unison member across Scotland balloted for strike action.
“If that’s a successful ballot, then we could be looking at strike action and industrial action in every area of every council in Scotland.”
He said that after the current two weeks of industrial action are out of the way the union will decide on the next steps.
Perth and Kinross Council was unable to carry out risk assessments of primary schools and nurseries due to the October holidays, meaning facilities could not open immediately.
The council said schools could open later this week, but the situation is likely to remain “fluid” for the duration of the action, and “may change for individual schools on a day-to-day basis”.
It said remote learning will be provided when schools are closed to pupils because teachers are not taking part in the industrial action.
The First Minister has previously described the targeting of his seat as “unacceptable” and said there is “no justification” for it.
He added there is no more money for the Scottish Government to hand local authorities to fund a better deal.
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 hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel