UNISON saves the pay in Surrey County

A fantastic campaign by members of UNISON’s Surrey County branch has seen staff receive the pay rise they were entitled to.

UNISON Members in the Adult Social Care workforce in Surrey County Council don’t seem to hear much positive news about their jobs these days, but February 2018 brought some very good news indeed, and a huge collective “sigh of relief “for nearly 300 professionally registered staff, mostly Social Workers and Occupational Therapists.

This was because senior Councillors agreed that the incremental pay increase that these staff had been awarded and paid in the 2017 July pay award, should stand, and not be seen as a “over-payment error“, as staff had previously been told.

It also meant that 62 staff who had not yet been paid the increment owed (mainly in Mental Health services) will receive this backdated. Earlier this month the employer conceded that these workers:

“should have the progression payment confirmed, with no recovery of monies paid, and the 62 staff whose pay was manually calculated so did not receive the payment, should now receive this back-dated to July 2017.”

This was a team effort where UNISON (working at all levels) lead a successful campaign to ensure staff were given the pay rise they were entitled to have.

UNISON put together an evidence based, well researched position, that was strong on merit, backed up by the threat of legal action and industrial action if all other negotiations failed.