Let Glasgow Flourish

In 2017, the people of Glasgow voted for the biggest change in local government the city has experienced in generations.

Running a city of Glasgow’s scale, with its ambitions and opportunities, but also its challenges, is a huge honour. But in the past it has overwhelmed some, as seen by the previous Labour administration.

The SNP is committed to moving Glasgow forward and fixing Labour’s mistakes. Here’s how.

Equal Pay

The issue of equal pay in Glasgow goes back decades. However, the specific claims facing the council now relate to a Labour decision in 2006 to create a complex pay structure, which favoured predominately male roles. You can read more about this here.

Instead of having meaningful discussions with staff to address the issue, or even testing the basis of the claims, Labour spent more than £2 million pounds continuing to defend this indefensible pay scheme in court.

Unlike Labour-run Glasgow, the SNP administration are committed to settling the equal pay issue. Our action so far:

• In January, we took the hugely significant step of ending the legal action and abandoning any appeal route, instead focusing on resolving this dispute through negotiation.
  
• We scrapped the discredited pay and grading system and replaced it with the fairer scheme used by the vast majority of other Scottish councils – one which should have been put in place by Labour in the first place.
  
• We have made real progress in pivotal workforce issues which have underpinned this inequality, including bringing Cordia, where most of the affected women are employed, back under council control.
  
• There are now more than 30 full-time members of staff dealing with this issue – and the council are employing 10 more.
  
• We are working hard on a financial strategy which will allow us to meet the cost and as part of that we are having technical discussions with civil servants.

People’s Palace

There has been a lot of misinformation, much of it deliberate, circulating about the future of the People’s Palace and Winter Gardens. The Winter Garden will close at the end of the calendar year on grounds of health and safety. The Council are working on options for a sustainable future for the Winter Gardens.

A £350,000 plan to ensure the People’s Palace remains open independently of the Winter Gardens has been approved by the council’s City Administration Committee.

In the meantime, the council is also working on a wider, culturally-led Heritage Strategy to provide a better understanding of the condition of the city’s assets and how to maintain them in a more sustainable way.

This is in stark contrast to Labour, who never put any strategy in place around how to maintain the city’s key cultural assets.

Cordia

The SNP administration has brought Cordia, who employed thousands of carers, janitors and other staff, back under council control.

This means that for the first time in over a decade our Council directly provides care for the citizens of Glasgow.

Looking to the future

Despite the mess that Labour left behind, the SNP administration have been working hard for the people of Glasgow to move the city forward.

Here are just some of the things the SNP administration are doing:

• Introducing Scotland’s first ever Low Emission Zone in Glasgow City Centre to reduce pollution levels and improve air quality.
  
• Extending free school meals to P4, benefitting 6,000 children in Glasgow.
  
• Investing £3 million to overhaul outdated school pitches across the city and replace them with multi-use games areas.
  
• Introduced Glasgow’s first ever Social Enterprise Strategy in the city.
  
• Launching a Strategic Bus Partnership to ensure public transport offer fits the needs of the city.
  
• To tackle the specific needs in the city of Glasgow, the council have established a rough sleeping task force and embedded the Housing First approach.