Council workers win judicial interest on equal pay award

More than 300 employees of North Lanarkshire Council have won a significant boost to their equal pay claim after an employment tribunal ruled that they were entitled to interest at the judicial rate on thir award.

The Glasgow tribunal held that it did not have power to vary the rate of interest that can be awarded, despite an argument for the employers that it would be unfair and result in serious injustice to apply the judicial rate of 8%.

Certain decisions in the Court of Session have applied a lower rate where the judicial rate was considered too high to produce a just result, but the tribunal held that its regulations only gave it a discretion over the period over which interest should run. In the present cases it chose the mid-pioint date of the claims (between the date of the calculation), giving some of the claimants interest from January 2007.

However the tribunal rejected a further claim for damages for injury to feelings, holding that this did not normally form part of a contractual claim, and breach of a contract of employment was not an exception to this general rule.

Carol Fox of Fox & Partners, who acted for the claimants, commented: "We are really delighted to have a further decision in favour of our claimants. We expected to win on interest and hope that all councils with outstanding equal pay cases will now think very carefully about continuing to defend this litigation. In summer 2015 many of these cases will reach their 10th anniversary."

She added that the claimants would "give consideration to [the damages ruling] in relation to any possible appeal".