Leisure World Colchester yoga staff to vote on strike amid pay row

Leisure World instructors are directly employed by Colchester City Council

Yoga, aerobics and Pilates instructors have been voting on whether to strike in a dispute over pay.

Unison said its members at Colchester City Council have not had a pay rise for almost a decade.

The union said Leisure World instructors were directly employed by the council but their pay was determined differently to the scales used for other staff at the authority.

A council spokesman said it was under "unprecedented" financial pressure.

Yoga and Pilates rates have remained at £25 a session since 2015, said Unison, while aerobics instructors received £22.50 per class.

'Bending over backwards'

Yoga instructor Arlene, who has worked for Colchester Council since 2016 and did not give her full name, said: "It's a wonderful community at Leisure World and the people taking classes are so supportive of each other.

"But I don't even reach the minimum wage for the classes I teach, with all the preparation that goes into them.

"It doesn't feel like we're even considered to be working for the council. They've never increased the market rate. Everyone else in the building gets a pay rise but we're forgotten."

Unison's eastern area organiser Emma Aboubaker said: "Instructors are bending over backwards to provide the best service they can for people trying to get fit and healthy in Colchester, but bosses can't stretch to more than one pay rise a decade.

"Fitness instructors provide a vital service for the city's public health, but they're also bringing paying residents into leisure centres.

"They deserve a proper pay rise."

Pam Donnelly said the cost of living crisis was placing the council under "unprecedented pressure"

Pam Donnelly, the council's chief executive, said she was "disappointed" to hear employees were balloting on industrial action.

She said an updated pay offer had been made to them that she hoped would help to reach a resolution.

"Like every resident and business in the UK, the cost of living crisis alongside the recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic, rising energy costs and the current economic climate, is placing an unprecedented pressure on local authority budgets, and Colchester City Council is no exception," Ms Donnelly added.