Around 1000 Glasgow council workers are in line to receive thousands of pounds in equal-pay catch-up payments at the end of June.

Offers will be made in the middle of next month in line with a mechanism agreed between the city council and lawyer Stefan Cross, whose Action4Equality organisation has pursued their cases on a no-win no-fee basis.

He said the workers, mainly school dinner ladies, home helps and nursery workers, would get payments ranging from a few thousand pounds to £15,000.

A council spokesman said they had agreed a framework for calculating payments, but it was impossible at this stage to say what the settlement would cost. The deal is the latest step in a saga that has left local authorities struggling to meet back-dated settlements running into hundreds of millions of pounds after the full extent of pay inequality suffered by women came to light.

Glasgow has brought in a pay restructuring deal to cope with the payments, but a trail of grievances has been left with some workers complaining that their wages would be levelled down to reduce the gap.

Cuts in services are threatened and unions have been accused of soft- pedalling claims through fear of job losses.

Women have complained about being subjected to time-share selling techniques used at council road shows to pressure them into accepting offers less than they thought they were due, and lawyers like Mr Cross have stepped in to encourage them to pursue claims at industrial tribunals.

A previous offer led to accusations that the women were being pressured into accepting less than they were owed so they could have the money for Christmas.

Mr Cross says that has been improved.