Unite City of Edinburgh Council Branch – Edinburgh Council Workers Unite!

Unite campaign to fund our councils

Fair Funding for Local Authorities campaign

Councils have been struggling to make ends meet for years now. Mostly this is down to a combination of ever increasing costs and lower than needed financial settlements from the Scottish Government. Council tax covers less than 20% of council financial needs with 75% to 80% from the Scottish Government and a small amount from charges and fees for council services.

The costs increases are often inflationary. They include electricity, fuel, insurance, vehicles, PPE and many other items and services that councils must purchase, in addition to cost of living pay increases. Demographic changes can also significantly affect costs as rising populations need more services (especially for groups such as school age and those whose health is impaired).

A further significant expenditure item for councils is the interest they have to pay on loans taken out in order to build schools, offices, community centres, care homes and the likes. These loans are usually made to councils by the Public Works Loans Board (an arm of the UK Treasury) and councils often pay 10% or more of their budgets, in interest alone, back to the UK Treasury.

Unite’s Fair Funding campaign is about ending the cutting of council services and jobs by pressing governments to properly support our councils to deliver the services needed by the public.

Find out more and add your weight to the campaign through the campaign page.

Campaign for Fairness – world cup bank holiday

Since February this year, when Scotland’s first minister announced a bank holiday to celebrate Scotland’s men’s football team achieving qualification to the world cup in North America, our branch, alongside GMB Edinburgh and Lothians branch, has been campaigning for our employer to appreciate its workers.

The campaign has involved:

A consultative ballot of all members which showed that 70% of members were unhappy with the council’s decision not to award the bank holiday
Targeted balloting which made sure the council knew the issue would not go away
Pressing senior council officials to hold discussions on suitable alternatives to a bank holiday
Lobbying councillors on the issues of fairness, decency and respect towards workers with a view to examining what can be done to recover this

The focus of the campaign has always been about how the employer treats its workforce, despite some confusions over football, the world cup and bank holidays. Our aims have always been true to the purpose of getting our council to appreciate workers and we have suggested that an extra day of annual leave might be a good start.

As a result of our campaigning the council will consider what is possible at the Finance and Resources committee in September with any recommendations debated and voted on at the Full Council meeting in November. Our branch will maintain our efforts to achieve decency.

Industrial Action in Facilities Management, Fleet Services and Waste Services (nightshift)

Following discussions around the world cup bank holiday with many council workers, a consultative ballot of the whole branch membership, submission of an Avoidance of Industrial Dispute communique and discussions with senior council representatives Industrial Action ballots have now been issued to specific groups of workers (as above). Unite the Union and GMB members are being balloted.

These ballots is now necessary as the council has not been considering offering decency to its workforce over this matter. The groups being balloted at this point have been chosen to encourage the council to see sense. The purpose is not to ask the council to reverse its decision but to ask that the council be considerate towards its workers.

Strike ballot for the World Cup holiday opens 18 May

Night-shift waste and cleansing, Facilities Management and Fleet Maintenance balloted for strike

Unite is balloting members to take strike action, following the Council’s decision not to grant an additional day’s holiday in line with the Scottish Government’s decision to declare 15 June a national holiday. Read more about the background of this dispute.

The ballot opens on 18 May 2026. This is a postal ballot, so if you are part of one of the groups being balloted, please keep your eye on the letterbox and return the ballot as soon as you receive it.

GMB is also part of the dispute and will be balloting members for strike action. Unison is not involved.

Members being balloted for strike action

We are balloting:

Night shift waste and cleansing workers, ballot closes on 2 June
All members in Facilities Management, ballot closes on 10 June
All members in Fleet Maintenance, ballot closes on 10 June.

If you’re in one of these groups and do not receive a ballot by 22 May, call the office on 0131 556 9676.

World Cup Bank Holiday

Should Edinburgh Council Workers be treated the same as other Public Service Workers?

image of hand placing ballot into ballot box — Consultative ballot on willingness to take Industrial Action over The City of Edinburgh Council’s refusal to give workers the Bank Holiday for the men’s World Cup

On 5 February 2026, the Scottish Government declared Monday 15 June 2026 a national holiday in recognition of Scotland men’s football team qualifying for the World Cup for the first time since 1998. The First Minister stated that “Scotland will be on the world stage this summer and I want as many people as possible to be able to celebrate that moment”. However, 35 councillors in Edinburgh do not think council workers deserve to enjoy this moment, despite it being granted to all NHS Scotland employees and employees in comparable city councils in Scotland.

When granting the holiday to NHS staff, John Swinney noted that “I am deeply grateful for all they continue to do to drive progress and this holiday recognises that.” With this public messaging on the intention behind the holiday, there is little wonder that council workers in Edinburgh may feel aggrieved that this gratitude is not being extended to them and affronted that elected members would exclude them from this moment that as many people as possible are supposed to be able to enjoy.

Following extensive discussions with groups of Council Workers it become clear that there exists huge dissatisfaction at our employer’s decision not to give the workforce this holiday. As a result of this dissatisfaction our branch has initiated 2 actions which will run simultaneously: