Without wishing to dampen the enthusiasm to reject anything other than a decent pay rise - I'm all for that... I too find it insulting to be told there is no money for a pay rise in these tough times while, at the same time, be told we are a healthy, profitable company that can afford to pay large dividends more than once a year.
However! Linking the money spent on the dividend(s) to a pay deal is misleading. Dividends are one-off payments with no future liability. Pay rises incur not only the cost of implementation and back-dating, but also an increase in future liability for every year until we all retire, both on monthly salary and on potential redundancy costs (obviously in their thinking). If we were all happy to take a nice wedge as a lump sum, rather than a salary rise, I'm sure money would be found - nobody in their right mind would accept though... Would they??
