Care workers across the city are asking Sunderland City Council to show them some love and end pay and pension discrimination this Valentine's Day.

• Where: Sunderland City Hall, Plater Way, Sunderland, SR1 3AA
• When: Friday, 14 February from 12 noon to 1pm
• Contact: Laura Maughan on 07973 708786 or email: [email protected]

This Valentine's Day (Friday 14 February) care workers will be gathering at Sunderland City Hall, to deliver a clear message to council leaders - 'Treat us with love and stop discriminating against us'. 

Women workers will be delivering large Valentine's cards to the authority and asking them to pay up.

For almost eighteen months, workers at Sunderland Care and Support (SCAS), have been fighting for equal pay. 

These mainly women workers have been denied access to the pension scheme of other local authority workers and are paid less per hour than those who work in male dominated roles.

Following the failure of Sunderland’s leadership to negotiate with GMB, legal claims have now been lodged, but workers dying before pay justice is served is heartless, immoral and a waste of tax-payers money. 

Our members, although heartbroken at the leadership's decision, are determined to make a stand.

GMB, the only union campaigning for equal pay, will continue with a high-profile determined campaign against Sunderland Council, until they get around the table and settle on what our members rightly deserve 

With Birmingham City Council finally settling their own long running pay dispute, GMB are now calling on Sunderland Council to do the right thing by these workers and deliver on equal pay.

Laura Maughan, GMB Organiser, said:

"This Valentine's Day care workers across Sunderland are asking Sunderland City Council to show them the love they deserve all year round. 

"For far too long these lasses have been undervalued and underpaid. 

"This is ‘Heart Unions’ week and GMB is making it clear that we will never give up on the battle for equal pay in Sunderland.

"We will be taking our case directly to City Hall, and telling the leadership that it's time to learn the lessons of Birmingham, and do right by both care workers and the tax payers' of Sunderland."

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