Strathclyde Police staff under threat: UNISON's Gerry Crawley on BBC Scotland website

In response to Strathclyde Police proposals to cut jobs UNISON Scotland Regional Organiser Gerry Crawley commented to BBC Scotland as follows:

Unison branch officer Gerry Crawley said that if Strathclyde Police did not achieve its savings targets up to 800 civilian posts could go in addition to 400 police posts.

"Our big fear is that there is going to be compulsory redundancies," he said.

"The only decision that the police authority took today was to effectively cut the voluntary redundancy package on offer to staff.

"Although the cash offer is still unaffected the pension terms have been reduced. How do they expect to achieve 600 voluntary redundancies this way?"
 
Strike threat

Mr Crawley said Unison had agreed to make a joint approach, with Strathclyde Chief Constable Stephen House, to the Scottish government over the cash crisis facing the force.

He said the scale of the cuts being implemented meant that industrial action "could not be ruled out" and pledged to "fight for every job" under threat.

The scale of the projected budget shortfall facing Strathclyde Police is likely to become clearer after the Scottish government's spending review in October.

The voluntary redundancy package on offer to staff will run until the end of October.

Once the uptake is known, with the likely projected budget shortfall, the force will have to decide whether to pursue voluntary redundancy of support staff.

If any industrial action is called in response to such a decision it is likely to be next year.



(see Strathclyde Police to cut 600 civilian staff  26 August 2010 Last updated at 17:01  on BBC Scotland News website for full story)


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