Nottingham City Council still has not paid out to all affected workers after the Supreme Court ruled against the authority over its freezing of staff pay rises. The freeze on incremental pay rises was initially introduced in 2011 as the council sought to save £232m. It said this was down to its main Government grant being cut by two-thirds.
It had said the freeze had saved the equivalent of around 1,000 full-time jobs and, had it not been introduced, "job losses would have been unavoidable". However the case was soon taken to the Court of Appeal which decided the council had been wrong to freeze incremental pay rises.
And the council decided to appeal that decision, taking the case to the Supreme Court. Despite paying hundreds of thousands of pounds in legal fees, it refused the Labour-run authority's application and the case was sent back down to an employment tribunal where settlements were agreed.
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The lack of payment to staff involved had been raised by Nottinghamshire Live in April last year, when it was understood that less than 25% of 600 cases had received a pay-out.
It still remains an issue over a year later. An unnamed source told Nottinghamshire Live: "They were on this contract where your pay went up every year until you got to a certain level. But the city council decided to stop the increment and kept it on whatever you were on at the time.
"The case has been determined. They just seem to be dragging their heels over it. Surely there is a deadline?"
The case was heart at both the Court of Appeal and Supreme Court back in 2018. The council said last year parties involved had agreed the timescales were 'unrealistic' - largely due to Covid - and the time to pay out was extended.
At that time more than half had been 'processed', it said. Responding to the concerns, a city council spokesman added: “The process for sending out payment calculations was started many months ago and payments have already been made to a number of successful claimants. The claimants should all be liaising with their solicitors for updates in relation to their particular claims.”
Are you one of the 600 yet to receive your pay-out? Let us know by emailing joseph.locker@reachplc.com.
