NLC Update

As the summer holiday season in Scotland begins to draw to a close, I think this is probably a good time to post a brief update about the the ongoing fight for equal pay in North Lanarkshire.

As regular readers know a series of meetings has been arranged during August to pursue settlement talks with the Council, but if these discussions do not result in real progress towards resolving all the outstanding equal pay claims, then all the cases will return immediately to the Employment Tribunal in Glasgow.

For obvious reasons, there will not be a 'running commentary' on the settlement discussions with the Council, but as soon as there is any news to report (one way or the other) the details will be published here on the A4ES blog site.

Lots of people will have been on holiday during July and so I plan to re-post various articles from the blog site about North Lanarkshire, which have been published over the past month or so, to bring everyone bang up to date.

I have been as active as ever on the Freedom of Information (FoI) front and there are some very interesting developments to share with readers from North Lanarkshire.

So watch this space. 

Choice in Politics (3 July 2014)

A number of readers from North Lanarkshire have been in touch to say that they are sadly disappointed at the lack of support from local Labour politicians, both councillors and MSPs.

Now that's a real shame because equal pay isn't about party politics - it's about doing the right thing without fear of favour and acting in a way that's open and transparent.

So if you ask me, local politicians of all parties (and no parties) ought to be holding the senior management of the Council to account and demanding a proper explanation as to how North Lanarkshire got itself into this terrible mess.

But it's not all one-way traffic because I received an email the other day from a reader whose local Labour councillor said he was absolutely on her side and was kicking up a fuss within the Council's ruling Labour group.

Good for him, because that's exactly what he should be doing and I'm sure there are decent people in all the local political parties who feel the same way.

The good thing to know is that local politics gives you a choice these days - there are always 3 or 4 local councillors to each local council ward, so if particular person is not very supportive then the solution is to take your case elsewhere.

The same is true of MSPs who sit in the Scottish Parliament - everyone local area has its own 'constituency' MSP but if that person is a bit of a 'dud', then a local constituent can approach one of the other MSPs from the regional list which takes in the North Lanarkshire Council area.

In other words, don't be fobbed off or pushed around - unlike the Westminster Parliament the political make-up of Scotland's councils and the Scottish Parliament gives the voters a choice of whom to approach for support.

So use it wisely, and whenever necessary.