Derry & Strabane Councillors and Aldermen approve first wage increase in 6 years

At a Governance and Strategic Planning Committee meeting in early January members were presented with an updated scheme of allowance, from the Department for Communities (DfC), which would see each members’ annual basic allowance increase from £15,071, the basic allowance for 2019, to £17,456.

At Tuesday’s Full Council Meeting members voted in favour of the pay rise, which will be valid from April last year.

Independent councillor Paul Gallagher proposed accepting the new scheme of allowances and said the district was “the highest area of deprivation in the North and further afield”.

He noted that he and other members have been campaigning and attending picket lines around wage equality.

Councillor Gallagher added: “If this council is campaigning and passing motions around wage disparity and trying to get equal pay, I believe that this equality falls within the scheme of allowances.”

“The circular says the all determinations are made by DfC [so] it’s not us voting for a pay rise.

“I’m asking that we share and proactively support equality across councils, because I don’t think we’re doing workers any favours by reinforcing disparity.”

UUP Alderman Darren Guy agreed that the scheme was an “independent assessment of allowances”, and argued that rejecting a pay rise could lead to “issues with rates further down the field”.

SDLP councillor John Boyle said that, in previous years, his party rejected the pay rise as many constituents were picketing for “fair pay for a fair day”.

He said: “Those circumstances, in our view, have moved on significantly for those people, [and] there are people in this chamber who work diligently for their constituents and whose only income is the allowance.

“We don’t think it’s appropriate that we decide if someone does or doe not get this uptake, [but] it’s important that we introduce some degree of parity.”

People Before Profit councillor Shaun Harkin voted to reject the pay increase and argued that members should not have to vote on decisions around their own pay.

“I think it’s unfair because the vast majority of workers don’t get to do that,” he said. “There were a lot of picket lines over the last couple of years but the pay of public sector, private sector, and community sectors workers is not going up because of rental costs and the cost of food.

“We asked Stormont to take this out of our hands and where is the action on that? This is a huge issue and still we’re here today being forced to make a decision on our pay.”

Independent councillor Gary Donnelly abstained from voting on the increase as, although the allowance was the only income source for some members, it should not be a council decision.

DUP Alderman Keith Kerrigan argued that accepting the increase was a “rubber stamping exercise”, with the amount set by DfC, but it was essential to avoid disparity among the 11 local councils.

“I raise my disappointment and frustration that this has to come before council at all,” he concluded. “But there is frustration again that there are councillors on different allowances when we’re elected across all 11 councils to do the same job.”

Andrew Balfour,

Local Democracy Reporter.