Gilman, Mark

The cases have been hailed as a major victory for all National Health Service (NHS) staff by the Manufacturing, Science and Finance (MSF) trade union, which represented the workers involved in their cases. The union's national secretary, Roger Kline said that the: "case is a momentous one. It has implications for women staff throughout the NHS and other industries. It is a landmark decision and is the biggest single breakthrough on equal pay for women for many years."

The /Seymour-Smith/ case has raised the issue of the legality of the two-year qualifying period of employment before employees may bring a claim for unfair dismissal. The /Observer/ in April reported that many employees are having their employment contracts terminated only days before completing the two-year period which is necessary to gain employment protection. At present, full-time employees must have accumulated two years' continuous service, while for employees who work between eight and 16 hours per week, the qualifying period is five years.

April 1997 was a very good month for securing the future of British car plants. The Ford Halewood plant on Merseyside and the Peugeot Ryton plant in Coventry have both secured the production of new vehicles into the next century. The future of Rover's Longbridge plant is in the balance while an announcement is delayed over whether a new model /Mini/ will be produced.

On 10 March, after 11 hours of talks, a "historic deal" was reached for public sector council workers. The agreement, covering 1.5 million workers, will harmonise conditions for manual worker s and white collar worker s in local government for the first time.

The typical trade union member of the future could well be a 30-year-old female VDU operator, balancing both work and family responsibilities, according to the TUC. A new report launched at the TUC's women's conference held in Scarborough on 12-14 March, argues that if unions can rise to the challenge, the number of women members could increase by as many as 400,000 by the turn of the century. According to the report (/Women and the new unionism/), women now make up half of the workforce, but only a third are members of a union. Young women are thought to be particularly difficult to organise. Only 6% of women employees under the age of 20 years are presently union members, compared with 24% aged between 20 and 29 years old.

The UK has been the main recipient of Toyota's European investment so far, at its plant in Derby. If the UK were to lose the new investment to France, it would be a huge blow to the Government which recently had to "rebuild some fences" after the company announced in February 1997 that it might switch its investment elsewhere in Europe if the UK did not join the single European currency.

In November 1996, the UK Government failed in its attempt to have the 1993 Directive on certain aspects of the organisation of working time (93/104/EC) - which lays down specific requirements concerning weekly hours, holidays, shifts and other patterns of work - annulled by the ECJ. The DTI launched consultations with business organisations on implementation of the Directive in December 1996, and the process was completed in March 1997. The DTI is now analysing the responses, but is unlikely to produce the results until some time after the 1 May general election.

At the beginning of March the first steps were taken towards the creation of the first "European super union". One of Britain's biggest trade unions, the General, Municipal and Boilermakers' Union (GMB), signed a joint membership agreement with the German chemical workers' union. The deal between the GMB and IG Chemie-Papier-Keramik means that 1.8 million workers will be entitled to joint membership. Although the two unions may not provide the same services, UK workers in Germany can expect legal advice, support from representatives, and training facilities, while German workers in the UK can expect legal advice, health and safety information and financial benefits (Record DE9703206N [1]). [1] www.eurofound.europa.eu/ef/observatories/eurwork/articles/joint-union-membership-for-german-and-uk-workers

In recent years there has been increasing public concern over what is widely viewed as the spiralling remuneration of company directors. At a time when companies are keen to promote pay schemes based on performance, too often the links between directors' pay and performance are viewed as non-existent. In a report on director's remuneration publicised in March 1997, the IOD is keen to set the record straight. It argues that, although it recognises that directors' pay in the largest companies has been on average high, it has been relatively modest for those directors who work for small to medium-sized enterprises. In fact, the median pay increase for this group of directors in 1996 was 4%, the equivalent of the increase in average earnings for all employees in that year.

The Trades Union Congress (TUC) launched its campaign to put workers' rights at the centre of the general election on 14 February 1997. The campaign, which will cost GBP 1 million, includes newspaper and cinema ads, billboards and leaflets.