Unite launches strikes ballot over Edinburgh council tracking drivers

Unite the union will ballot around 100 workers employed by the City of Edinburgh Council in a dispute over tracking drivers in housing services.

The dispute is over the use of data collected by telematics in vehicles. In June 2025, Edinburgh council proposed introducing 'exception reports' which record each time a vehicle is used more than an hour before or after a shift. These reports are thereafter sent on to line manages.

Unions previously negotiated a telematics policy with the council so that it was based on the system improving driving standards and ensuring safety. It had protections against using the technology to intrude on members’ privacy. The policy was agreed to in May 2023.

Under the policy, managers must request telematics data from Fleet Services and have legitimate reasons for accessing the data. The council is now trying to breach its own policy through exception reports.

Unite’s housing services members are concerned about ‘overreach’ into their privacy, and the potential abuse of the telematics system by management to target workers which will lead to disciplinary triggers if a commute takes more than an hour.

The union has raised repeated concerns with Edinburgh council to avoid an escalation in the industrial dispute, but management have continued to signal their intention to proceed with the exception reports.

Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said: “Edinburgh council have continued down a route which is causing major concerns for our members in housing services.“The changes to the tracking system have the potential to be abused by management to target workers. That’s entirely unacceptable. Unite will back our members all the way in this fight.”

The ballot opens on Friday 21 November and closes on 5 January 2026.If the ballot for industrial action is successful, then industrial action in the new year by Unite’s members would lead to all housing services repairs and maintenance being cancelled for Edinburgh tenants.

In a consultative ballot in August, Unite’s members across all housing services trades including electricians, joiners, heating engineers, and plumbers overwhelmingly backed strike action and action short of a strike.

Unite industrial officer Graeme Smith added: “Unite has no option but to ballot our members in Edinburgh council’s housing services because management continue to ignore our calls for dialogue.“The proposed change to the tracking system's use are designed to do one thing only and that is to further increase the surveillance on workers.

“New technology is being introduced without sufficient controls to ensure its use is fair and reasonable.”

ENDS 

Notes to Editors: 

For media enquiries contact: Andrew Brady on 07810 157922 or andrew.brady@unitetheunion.org Unite Scotland is the country’s biggest and most diverse trade union with around 150,000 members.