The company that runs the Metro system in Newcastle could face a bill of more than £1m after six female staff won their equal pay case.
The six workers, classed as Metro operators, took their cases to an employment tribunal and told how they were paid £21,000 while men, with the title of Metro train drivers, were given salaries of £27,000 to do the same job.
The tribunal ruled in their favour and said the women were entitled to backpay with the amounts to be decided by the tribunal at a later date. It will cost the firm at least £200,000.
Nexus was also ordered to pay the same rate to the Metro operators as it does to its drivers. Now 68 other female staff could demand wage increases of around £6,000 a year to put them level with male colleagues doing comparable jobs. And they could also ask for backpay – adding just under £1m to the firm’s wage bill.
Train drivers’ union Aslef said the decision was “a victory for common sense”.
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