WORKERS for Oxford City Council will earn a minimum of £7 an hour after union members approved a wages deal.

This is £1.20 more than the national £5.80 minimum wage, aimed at compensating for the high cost of living in the city.

The change is part of a new simplified pay structure drawn up by the council following a £300,000, three-year review to see whether employees were being paid enough.

The arrangements, which will come into force on October 1, were backed by two thirds of union members following a ballot.

It means some employees will be forced to take a pay cut, although the majority will receive a pay increase.

Last month, the Oxford Mail revealed Oxford is Britain’s least affordable city, with the average house price hitting £339,237, or 13 times the average salary of £25,896.

Council leader Bob Price said: “All the jobs in the council have been re-evaluated in a job evaluation scheme and put into a new grade structure.

“For example, there is a number of managerial jobs which were on a managerial salary when they did not have any managerial responsibility and they will now be put on a lower salary.

“But more people are being upgraded than being down graded. The ones that have been upgraded tend to be the jobs that have front line responsibility interacting with the public, such as people who deal with housing benefits.

“We made a commitment we would establish a living wage of £7 an hour and we took into account the cost of living in Oxford which is much higher than the national picture.”

Wages of all but 200 of the council’s 1,400 employees were reviewed – those earning more than £50,000 per year were evaluated in a different scheme.

Mr Price added: “Our budget has been calculated on the basis of the new grades, so in that sense it was cost neutral in terms of the budget.”

Local authorities were asked to review pay scales following a national agreement with Unison and the Transport and General Workers’ Union 10 years ago, although no time limit was set for completion.

Council chief executive Peter Sloman said: “It represents an important milestone in our council’s rapid improvement journey and shows what can be achieved when trade unions, management and staff work together to achieve shared goals.”

Unison’s Oxford branch secretary Alistair Bastin said: “We’re pleased that Oxford City Council now has a pay structure in place which aims to fairly reward staff while addressing past inequalities.”

Mr Price added: “I would like to pay tribute to the way the union officials have worked with the council managers to get it completed on time.”

eallen@oxfordmail.co.uk