Chief exec accused of ignoring ‘serious whistleblowing complaint’, as one-quarter of staff in one council section are facing losing their jobs – and all those to be made redundant are BAME women
Croydon in crisis: the council faces more turmoil after allegations of discrimination were submitted to
Members of the GMB union working in the council’s payroll department have voted to take strike action from April 19. If the strike action goes ahead, it could jeopardise monthly wages payments to all staff at the cash-strapped council, from £192,000 per year chief exec Katherine Kerswell downwards.
Unlike Kerswell, however, those council workers going on strike are among the less-well-paid at Fisher’s Folly, and they have voted to take industrial action over what they see as a discriminatory restructuring plan in which one-quarter of the payroll staff will lose their jobs – all of them BAME women.
GMB union officials believe the redundancy proposals are discriminatory.
The council’s management is seeking to make £150,000-worth of savings in payroll, at a local authority with debts of £1.6billion.
Croydon Council has this month issued Council Tax demands with a 15per cent increase as part of its efforts to balance its budget.
In a statement issued to Inside Croydon, the GMB says: “The council are yet to act on grievances submitted by the staff and they are yet to reply to counter-proposals made by the same staff to look at saving money with no compulsory redundancies.”
GMB say that they met with representatives from the council’s personnel department last week: “But after an agreement was reached, no progress has been made towards this agreed way forward.”
The strike action is scheduled to last for two weeks, with potential for a further course of action to last six months.
GMB official Rachael Baylis said: “GMB members at Croydon Council have had enough of their jobs, pay, terms and conditions being the first thing to get attacked when the local authority is facing financial crisis.
Solidarity: the council’s payroll staff plan two weeks of strikes later this month
“Not only this, but there has been a gross failure by management to address the very serious grievances put in by our members regarding alleged bullying, harassment, racism, and numerous other forms of discrimination.
“Getting the budget to balance should not be at the expense of our members suffering inappropriate behaviour in an effort to steamroll through this unnecessary restructure.
“We call upon the council chief executive Katherine Kerswell and the Mayor of Croydon, Jason Perry, to take control of the senior management team and deal with the serious issues in hand – especially as the chief executive is yet to acknowledge receipt of the serious whistleblowing allegations submitted on March 27.”
Read more: Judge orders CEO Kerswell to face tribunal over racism claims
Read more: You can depend on Croydon Labour: they always let you down
Read more: Here’s the Mayor and 33 Croydon Tory councillors who THREE times voted in favour of hitting you with a 15% Council Tax hike
SIGN THE PETITIONS HERE
- Click here to sign the petition to Croydon Council to Say No to 15%
- And click here to sign the separate Council Tax petition to Parliament
- Inside Croydon – as seen on TV! – has been delivering local community news since 2010. 3million page views per year in 2020, 2021 and 2022.
- If you want real journalism, actually based in the borough, you should consider paying for it. Please sign up today. Click here for more details
- If you have a news story about life in or around Croydon, or want to publicise your residents’ association or business, or if you have a local event to promote, please email us with full details at inside.croydon@btinternet.com
- Our comments section on every report provides all readers with an immediate “right of reply” on all our content
- Inside Croydon works together with the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, as well as BBC London News and ITV London
