Unison members at Quarriers to strike this week

Unison members working for Quarriers, one of Scotland’s biggest social care charities have confirmed they will strike on Wednesday.

Staff were balloted on industrial action after pay talks with management broke down, Unison said. Quarriers management offered a 2.5 per cent pay rise and “refused” to target increases at the lowest earners, according to the union.

Unison said the strike action this week at four Quarriers projects would cause “major headaches” for the charity, despite involving just one-fifth of members.

Simon Mcfarlance, Unison regional officer, said: ”It is highly regrettable Quarriers intransigence and belligerence has led to this action being necessary, our members are now determined to show Quarriers how angry they are about their pay and how the charity has handled this dispute.”

Phil Robinson, chief executive, Quarriers said its local authority contracts income “fell short” of what the charity needed to pay its staff the increase they had demanded.

He said he had asked Unison to work with the charity over the coming year to take up the issue of funding with local authorities.

“Services from the voluntary sector should be funded on a like-for-like basis, so that our staff are not penalised, otherwise the voluntary sector will continue to subsidise public sector services. We regret the fact that a strike will apparently take place on 25 April,” Robinson added.

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