Proposed pay cuts for Bath and North East Somerset Council workers may not end up reducing anyone’s wages, the council has insisted — but trade unions are unconvinced.

The council’s employment committee is set to vote on May 14 on the council’s new pay structure. The controversial plan will reduce salaries for some council IT workers, although plans for a potential pay cut for workers in the passenger transport and waste and recycling departments would be addressed separately in the next three months.

In a statement issued this week, the council said 62 per cent of the council’s 3,500 staff would see their pay go up. Meanwhile 106 people who would see the pay for their role reduced would receive pay protection for three years. The council said: “At the end of that period it is possible no individual will see an overall reduction in pay.”

The council’s chief executive Will Godfrey said: “Our staff deliver valuable services and these proposals are fundamentally about fairness. We have undertaken extensive consultation and negotiation with trade union representatives on this since August 2024.

“Around three per cent of our staff will see their salary protected for three years. Nothing will change for drivers, loaders, recycling advisors and passenger transport for the time being. We will continue to work with these staff and trade unions to find the best way to implement our proposals.”

Amy Rushton, branch chair for trade union Unison which represents workers at the council, said: “It is astonishing that the council is claiming this is about ‘fairness’ when they are downgrading some of their lowest paid workers. The council cannot deny that those workers are worse off under these proposals even with pay protection in place.”

Although the pay structure changes going before the committee would affect 106 people, a further 245 workers in the passenger transport and waste and recycling departments could also face pay cuts when the proposals for those departments are implemented separately in the next three months.

Ms Rushton said: “Up to 351 people, a staggering 1 in 10 workers, are at risk of being downgraded, and we cannot stand by and allow that to happen. Many of these people have given years of dedicated service to the council and their communities.”

Councils can face equal pay claims when men are paid more than women for doing jobs which are considered equivalent. The council recently brought some adult social care contracts in house, meaning that a low paid predominantly female workforce has TUPEed (transferred under protected employment) to the council. The union said the proposed pay cuts are in departments which are predominantly male.

Council social worker and Unison activist Toni Mayo told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “As a woman and a social worker I don’t want equal pay to be addressed by men being paid less. We want women to be paid more.”

The council have said that once the national pay award is taken into account there will be a pay rise of more than six percent for some of the council’s lowest paid staff.