Glasgow City Council sends women equal pay settlement offers

Thousands of council workers staged a strike over the dispute

Female council workers affected by the equal pay dispute at Glasgow City Council are to receive equal pay offer letters in the coming days.

The long-running dispute centred on women who were paid up to £3 an hour less than male colleagues, despite being in the same pay grade.

The women affected will receive an average of £35,000 each under a settlement scheme announced in January.

The council said "individual offers" would be made to "thousands" of women.

• Deal struck over Glasgow equal pay dispute

• What was the dispute all about?

Mandy McDowall, Unison regional organiser, said: "It's been a long road but in the coming weeks we'll finally see money being rightly put back into the pockets of Glasgow's low-paid women.

"This represents compensation for the pay lost due to a discriminatory pay and grading system in place for over 12 years and will be one of the largest redistributions of wealth in Glasgow's history."

Righting a wrong

A Glasgow City Council spokeswoman said: "The council has delivered on its promise to resolve the equal pay dispute and, having agreed a deal with claimants' representatives, is now able to make detailed, individual offers to thousands of primarily women workers.

"We expect letters containing those offers to be distributed by unions and legal representatives over the coming days."

Council leader Susan Aitken added: "Settling the equal pay dispute earlier this year began the process of righting a wrong against our workforce and our communities - and, in particular, the women of the city - that had been allowed to hang around the neck of this council for far too long."

Susan Aitken said the council wanted to right a wrong