The unions negotiated four-year pay protection last year to cushion the impact of the changes and allow staff to make up the financial shortfall by working extra hours.
But in a letter to its employees the council warned, 'If you do not agree to the job change by the end of February 2007 then protection will be removed by providing you with appropriate contractual notice. Once the notice has expired you will be paid on the evaluated rate for your job.'
A spokesman told Nursery World, 'The council explored all practical means of removing people from protection on a permanent basis and identified job changes for nearly all employees affected by pay protection.' Fewer than 100 were receiving pay protection now, compared with 2,960 last year.
Jacqui Gallagher, Unison branch secretary in Sunderland, said that while the union was opposed to the removal of pay protection, it understood that the council was doing it to avoid court actions because 'protection can be seen as discriminatory'. The bill for implementing single status in Sunderland had reached £50m and 'could potentially go much higher', she added.
She said that Unison members should continue to have pay protection until the council guaranteed 'job enrichment', giving staff more responsibility and higher pay grades.
Bruni de la Motte, Unison national officer, said a group of solicitors in the north-east had been systematically going through agreements that had been reached. They had lodged cases against both employers and unions, many of them linked to claims for back pay over several years.
She said that around half of local authorities were either nowhere near implementing single status or, in some cases, had not even started - ten years after the process of equalising pay began.
Tricia Pritchard, professional officer at the Professional Association of Nursery Nurses, said, 'It is a confusing picture because a lot of local authorities have gone quiet on the issue. My gut feeling is that many are at a loss as to how to progress it now.'
Meanwhile support staff, including nursery nurses, at Holbrook Primary school in Coventry staged a three-day strike to demand a properly funded agreement. Richard Harty, corporate negotiator for Unison, said nursery nurses were the only group losing out in the process.
Anxiety about the outcome of single status negotiations has fuelled widespread concern in Birmingham, where thousands of council staff fearful of major changes to their pay and conditions were due to attend a mass protest rally this week.