NI Housing Executive: Striking workers reject pay offer

Striking workers at the Northern Ireland Housing Executive (NIHE) have rejected a pay offer made by its management in December.

The housing body had offered a one-off payment of £1,000 for those earning up to £32,000 and £500 to those on higher grades.

Some workers on the lowest wages were also offered an uplift of one pay point.

A national pay award of £1,925 was paid to all NIHE staff last month.

The trade union Unite said the proposals would benefit “only a small fraction of striking workers” and that following a picket line ballot, the offer was “overwhelmingly rejected” on Tuesday.

NIHE Chief Executive Grainia Long said that after five days of talks with the unions in November and December, it had “put a reasonable offer on the table”.

“In addition to the national pay award of £1,925 for all staff, we offered a one-off cost of living payment of £1,000 net for all staff earning up to £32,000, and £500 net for all other staff,” Ms Long said.

NIHE maintenance workers, including electricians, plumbers and joiners, began strike action over pay in September.

At the time, Unite said the strike, which involves about 300 of the roughly 3,500 NIHE staff, would remain in place for one month, but the dispute is now in its twenty third week.

It is affecting maintenance services in north and west Belfast, Portadown, Coleraine and Londonderry.

According to Unite, it has led to “ballooning impact on maintenance services for social housing units”.

In a statement, the union said there are 193 social housing units in the affected areas lying empty, despite instructions for work to change their tenancy.

It said more than 4,400 repair and maintenance jobs judged to be emergency have been left undone and a further 9,600 works deemed routine have not been completed. Two hundred adaption jobs needed by disabled tenants are also outstanding. 

Unite General Secretary Sharon Graham said the strike was having an impact on social housing tenants in the midst of a housing crisis.

“The fact that after standing 23 weeks on cold and wet picket lines, striking housing workers voted with more than a 99 percent majority to reject this pay offer tells its own story,” Ms Graham said.

“These workers don’t want to be standing on picket lines but have been left no alternative because of the intransigence of management. These workers continued their strike right through the holiday period and while they want to get back to work they are determined to do so having won respect and a decent pay improvement.” 

Ms Graham called on NIHE directors and officials in the Department for Communities to intervene.

“They need to make a decent pay offer, end this dispute and the impact it is having both on my members and on vulnerable tenants. Their failure to do so to date is nothing short of a disgrace,” she said.

However, Grainia Long defended the housing body’s offer.

“Taking the national award and the additional £1,000 payment together, this amounts to a 9.7 percent increase for an electrician and 12.5 percent increase for a plumber for the year 22/23,” the chief executive said in a statement.

“Our tenants pay for 70 percent of our staff salaries through their rents. In a cost of living crisis, our tenants would want to know that we are spending their money wisely.”

Unite regional officer Michael Keenan said: “Housing Executive bosses have sought to muddy the waters by referencing the 2022-2023 pay offer which has nothing to do with this pay dispute, which is about the 2021-2022 financial year.”