This remark was overheard on a Unison picket line in Tower Hamlets, north London yesterday: "Of course I'd take their 2.45 per cent if they would throw in the £24,000 a year John Lewis list that MPs get. That is more than I'm paid in a year."
It is an aspect of human nature that we are very aware of people who are better paid than we, and forgetful of those who get less. That mindset is audible in the undergrowth of the House of Commons, where there are MPs constantly muttering about all the company directors, lawyers, journalists, senior public servants, professional footballers who are on higher salaries than MPs.
Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of people get by on incomes of less than £2,000 a month, or even £1,000 a month. It was reported two days ago that inflation is up 3.8 per cent - bad enough as a headline figure, but the real inflation rate for people on low incomes is much higher. They spent proportionately much more of their income on food, fuel and, if they have a car, on petrol - ie on the basics which have had the greatest price increase. They are also the people who used to pay 10p in the pound income tax, and now pay 20p.
So we have a group of workers who are already among the lowest paid in the country, disproportionately hit by rising prices - and in their wisdom the Local Government Association, with the government's connivance, has decided that they must take a pay cut, to spare the rest of us the expense of paying them enough to protect their living standards.
What these people lack is industrial muscle. We are talking here about school assistants, dinner ladies, street cleaners, bin emptiers, dog wardens, librarians, care workers etc - not the labour aristocracy. They cannot close factories, blockade electricity stations or stop the trains running. They can strike and strike, in their hundreds of thousands, and the effect is hardly noticeable. All they can do is appeal to the public's sense of what is fair. But they are barely being heard, and in these unsettled times, the public at large may not be in a very sympathetic state of mind.
The public workers deserve to win this dispute, but I don't fancy their chances.
What about people on the dole? They get £60 a week.
Posted by: Neil Ist | Thursday, 17 July 2008 at 12:15 PM
Do Unison members get 2.5 months paid summer holiday, as MPs do?
I mean, assuming they bother to show-up for work at all unless there's a three-line whip demanding their attendance...
Posted by: Neil McGowan | Thursday, 17 July 2008 at 12:18 PM
Local Government workers get a basic holiday allowance of 21 days per year excluding bank holidays. Many of us also work on weekends, public holidays and evenings to cover essential services for which the Local Authorities have a 365 day a year duty to provide such as emergency homelessness services.
Unison members voted to take industrial action with heavy heart, because we do not want to be forced to seek work outside the public sector to ensure we can maintain our standard of living, but that is what is happening.
Local authorities are having to employ increasing numbers of agency workers and apply market forces supplements to the normal pay scales in order to fill posts that workers will not take up at the normal rate of local government pay.
Unison members are not seeking a higher pay rise than the private sector, we want the same (ave.4.4%) plus something towards the losses we suffered for the last 4 years (total 6%).
Our lowest paid members are on an annual salary of £11500 per year for doing to dirtiest, most uncomfortable and most important jobs in society..maintaining public health and hygiene.
Support your public services you need us more than you know.
Posted by: Karen | Thursday, 17 July 2008 at 07:05 PM
MPs think they should be paid at the level of people with skills? What will they think of next? They only work 33 weeks a year at Westminster (they're off shortly on their 'recess' - too ashamed to call it 'hols')until October. Which is good, really, as they can't screw up anything else in our treasured isle while in Tuscany or on the Caribbean. In the meantime the unions should think. And think. And think. Until they have found a way to harrass the government into being rational with pay. Continuous demonstrations outside Westminster would do it, having invited as many foreign camera crews as possible. Our leaders would become embarrassed and might even creep away.
Posted by: john problem | Friday, 18 July 2008 at 08:22 AM
"They can strike and strike, in their hundreds of thousands, and the effect is hardly noticeable"
Then what are they *doing* ?
The inconvenient truth is that most local government in the UK is little more than a tax payer funded, trade unionised protection racket.
Posted by: Anthony Price | Friday, 18 July 2008 at 09:31 AM
Anthony Price might like to see the impact if his bins are never emptied and his recycling crate never collected; if there's nobody to care for his elderly relatives and clean up after them; if schools have to close because teaching assistants are now so important a part of the education system that schools can't cope without them (more than 400 schools were closed in Wales alone during the two days of the strike); if his library or his local museum or zoo isn't open; if he can't have his marriage/civil partnership ceremony at the town hall; if the streets and pavements are not cleaned ...
The "inconvenient truth" is that Mr Price doesn't know what he's talking about.
Posted by: A Kendal | Friday, 18 July 2008 at 10:40 AM
I must declare. I am a retired social worker and former Unison member.
Mr Price does not miss local government workers unless and until he requires a service that he did not know he needed. For example, a lot of people suddenly find they need social workers - and I do not just mean families with children but also the elderly, frail and disabled and their carers.
We need a long-term solution to the problem of low pay, rather than staggering along with pay levels depressed over time through inflation.
Posted by: David Harries | Friday, 18 July 2008 at 12:34 PM