The mood of the rally (pictured) was lightened by the presence of fairground rides for children and a nursery nurse choir singing adapted seasonal tunes.
Carol Ball, chair of Unison's nursery nurse working group, said, 'There was a great turn- out. The demonstration was very well supported.'
A guest speaker from the London borough of Tower Hamlets told the demonstration about how nursery nurses in her area had also taken on their employer and won pay awards of 19,500 and 21,500 a year.
Meanwhile, Glasgow City Council has extended a pay and grading offer that has already been rejected by nursery nurses to a further 1,900 education service staff, including classroom assistants. The pay increases offered range from 3.1 per cent to 14.8 per cent.
Councillor Steven Purcell, Glasgow's education services convener, said, 'From our point of view there is an urgency in getting everyone round the table to discuss it, as we are currently preparing our budgets for next year and have the opportunity to take account of this in our budget plans.
Once the budget is set it is more difficult to revisit.'
Ms Ball said Unison was happy to discuss a pay offer to wider support staff, but would not speak about nursery nurses because it wanted a national settlement to the dispute. She said she thought the Glasgow offer was suspicious because the council had rejected a similar claim earlier this year and she feared that auxiliary staff may be being used as pawns in the nursery nurses' dispute.
Unison pointed out that nursery nurses earned between 10,000 and Pounds 13,000 a year in a role that had not been reviewed by employers for 15 years. The union wants to bring the nursery nurses into the local government pay system SCP 23 to 30, which would mean those working during term-time would earn around 18,500 a year.
The Confederation of Scottish Local Authorities has advised councils to negotiate at local level after Unison rejected its recommended pay increase of between 6.7 per cent and 12.5 per cent.
Unison is to hold a delegates' meeting this week and its disputes committee will also meet to discuss further action.
