New local authority worker strikes planned from 6th October as yesterday’s stoppages fail to generate settlement

With up to 200,00 local authority workers from the Unite, Unison and GMB unions on strike yesterday, bringing widespread disruption – as in Argyll – to ferries, schools, refuse collection and other services, there has been no move to settle the strike. The failure of the Confederation of Scottish Local Authorities (Cosla) to come to the table with better than the current offer of a below-inflation one-year rise of 2.5% has settled the resolve of the unions to take further action.

The next phase will see a series of smaller, localised strikes hitting selected areas and lasting for a fortnight. These will start from 6th October.

Yesterday’s strikes saw widely varied reactions across the local authorities. In Glasgow all Primary Schools, bar one, closed. Elsewhere schools were open and Unison has signalled that it is examining possible breaches of Health and Safety guidelines where schools were open in spite of the absence of key support staff who were striking.

The growing bitterness seems to be fuelled by a sense of betrayal in the Unions who say that Cosla went back on a promise to re-examine its initial offer of 2.5% per annum for a three year period and simply returned to negotiations restating the original offer. Their only concession was to offer to remove the tie of a three year agreement and make the offer of 2.5% apply to a one-year deal.