Edinburgh Council considers compensation for workers denied World Cup bank holiday

Edinburgh Council will explore giving staff some form of compensation for missing out on the World Cup bank holiday.

Some councillors – though not all – backed the position after city staff lost out on the day off after Scotland’s 1-0 win over Haiti in Boston.

Other major city councils, including Glasgow, Dundee and Aberdeen, voted to declare a public holiday on June 15, giving many council workers the day off.

Edinburgh Council voted against giving staff the bank holiday several months ago.

But they backed an exploration of how the city could make it up to them at a finance committee meeting on Tuesday.

Officers will now meet with representatives of staff, explore what kind of compensation could be given to them, and come back to the committee with a report.

Earlier in the meeting, two trade union representatives of council employees asked councillors to support Councillor Watt’s motion.

They added that it was an issue of ‘fairness, decency, equity, reasonableness and a lot of other things’ towards staff, rather than being an issue about football or a bank holiday.

One, representing trade union Unite, said: “The council should have asked, what can we do to be decent to our workforce?

“The council never gave anything to its workforce, it didn’t consider its workforce, and that’s what this is all about.”

Another, representing GMB, said: “If Edinburgh Council holds itself as a good employer, it should be asking itself the question, how does it find itself behind Glasgow and the other city councils on this?

“There are GMB members in care that have been put in a position where they are working with NHS members on overtime who have been awarded this holiday.”

At the meeting, finance convener and Labour councillor Mandy Watt told fellow members that staff deserved some form of compensation.

She stated: “What we have is our staff saying, you know, ‘we work that day, we kept the schools open’, it just felt to them like it would be nice to get some form of recognition for that.”

The council’s SNP group backed her position, proposing minor amendments to the motion she put forward.

Party councillor Adam Nols-McVey raised that staff were given a public holiday for the coronation of the King, which he stated came at a cost of £250,000 to the council.

He added: “It was clear that that was prioritised by this council, but yet our national team getting to the World Cup, having its first victory in decades, was not.

“Frankly, I think that was a huge missed opportunity. My very young kids might be very much older by the time we replicate it.”

Estimates put to councillors in advance of the bank holiday said granting staff the day off would have cost it in the area of £350,000.

However, the Liberal Democrat group were opposed to Councillor Watt’s proposal, referencing the council’s earlier decision in a document before the committee.

Liberal Democrat councillor Neil Ross said: “Until this council has the funding to get basic services right, extras like this, I’m afraid, are sadly not appropriate.”

The conservative group backed the Liberal Democrat position.

One councillor raised that neighbouring local authorities had not given employees the day off.

Right before the vote, and referencing the earlier decision, Councillor Watt said: “It was a really, really difficult thing to balance, and our staff, they do understand that.

“It was a difficult decision for us. What they’ve come back and said is, ‘look, can we just look and see what we can do to recognise the service [we] give, we’re as valued as staff at other city councils.’”

She added: “We’ll see what options are available to make them feel like they are valued, and they are.

”They’ve indicated that it wouldn’t necessarily be some kind of public holiday, it would be some other form of recognition they’d be willing to look at.”

Councillors backed Councillor Watt’s position by a vote of 7 to 4.