Birmingham reaches equal pay agreement

Birmingham City Council (BCC) and the GMB, UNISON and Unite unions have reached an agreement to settle 11,000 equal pay claims dating back to 2008.

The agreement follows a landmark court ruling last year, in which the Supreme Court ruled that equal pay claims can be brought through civil courts rather than employment tribunals. This extended the time limit for making a claim from six months to six years.

As a result, the 174 former BCC mainly women workers, including cooks, cleaners and care assistants, who brought the case could go ahead with their claims.

They claimed that they had been denied bonuses given to staff doing equivalent work in traditionally male-dominated jobs such as refuse collectors, street cleaners and road workers. This meant, for example, that the annual salary of a female manual grade 2 worker was £11,127, while the equivalent male salary was £30,599.

During 2007 and 2008, the council paid compensation to female council employees who were still working at the council.

But those who had left their jobs more than six months earlier were excluded.

GMB organiser Gill Whittaker explained that the agreement “means there is light at the end of a long dark tunnel for all those women who have worked hard doing an equivalent job to men but earning less than their male comparators”.

Whittaker described the agreement as “a great achievement for all those women who have suffered an injustice in their pay”.