At a meeting last week the public services trade union agreed that it would be investigating offers across local authorities in an attempt to end the dispute, which began on 1 March. Local pay deals have already been agreed with 15 of Scotland's 32 local councils. The latest to settle are East Dunbartonshire, Midlothian and North Lanarkshire.
Angela Lynes, chair of Unison's negotiators, spoke of the difficulty the union faced in agreeing to move to local negotiations, but said it could no longer ask the striking nursery nurses to 'continue to suffer in the face of the employers' intransigence'. She added that the nursery nurses would remain on strike until satisfactory local offers were made.
Joe Di Paola, Unison's Scottish organiser for local government, insisted that the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (CoSLA) had 'pig-headedly' refused to accept the sense of this situation, 'despite the overwhelming justice of the case for a national grade'. He said that offers from local authorities varied widely, with the lowest offer at 8.76 an hour and the highest at Pounds 10.46 per hour.
But some nursery nurses have criticised Unison's move. A Dundee member, who wished to remain anonymous, said she was angry at the way the union's head officials had not consulted the nursery nurses over the decision to re-enter negotiations with CoSLA over local deals.
