Scotland's largest trade union has a new leader and in her first interview she's told how campaigning for workers' rights helped to rise to the top job after leaving school with no qualifications.

Lilian Macer was appointed Scottish Secretary of Unison on August 1 and has spent the first two weeks of the role speaking to school staff across the country ahead of likely mass strike action launched by her union next month.

Ms Macer, who grew up in Wishaw, began her working life as a catering assistant for NHS Lanarkshire in 1984 qualifying as a cook in 1990.

Eight years later she joined Unison's return to learn course, an initiative run by the union to help members gain training and qualifications.

READ MORE: Schools set for strikes as Unison warns of sustained action

From there she used her new skills to work towards further qualifications and to forge a career in the NHS and in Unison, graduating from Caledonian University with a Masters Degree in Human Resource Management in 2011.

"I left school at 16 with no formal qualifications," Ms Macer told The Herald in an exclusive interview.

"Thirty two pupils in a class didn't help and if you didn't push yourself forward you got left behind. I later went on to further education - and for me that's why I think it's hugely important for the Scottish Government to invest in further and higher education. In particular further education to help those pupils who do get left behind in the school system."

She was recruited to be Unison's top official in Scotland from her job as the employee director for NHS Lanarkshire (a role which is part of its senior management team) which she had held since 2009, having previously worked in other NHS roles including as a projects manager.

Alongside her career in the NHS she was also Unison's Scotland convener for 13 years in a position which saw her lead many Scottish delegations to UK delegate conference, health Conference and Scottish Trade Union Council.

Ms Macer credited her later educational and career achievements with a confidence given to her through her trade union activism and her work with NHS Lanarkshire.

"It was the confidence and the support which I got from my trade union Unison and also my employer NHS Lanarkshire," she said.

"The support I got from Unison was phenomenal."

Ms Macer succeeds Tracey Dalling as Unison's Scottish Secretary and is only the second woman to hold the position.

But with a growing number of women now leading trade unions (both Unison and Unite at UK level are led by women while Roz Foyer leads the STUC), Ms Macer said the situation of male domination at the top of the unions is changing.

"Women may have been put off by the historic perception of what a trade union leader should be. A man from a certain background who had to shout loud and bang the table," she said.

"And I think now through education, through development, the pathways trade unions have created to allow women to take on more senior roles, have changed things significantly."

She said the one of the biggest challenges facing her members is a reduction in local government funding which has seen councils forced to cut services in many parts of Scotland and would like to see the Scottish Government match its stated ambition to be a fair work nation with action.

"The big issue for us is to make sure public services are fully funded so our members can deliver those services," she said.

"The Scottish Governments aims to be a fair work nation by 2025, in reality unless they recognise and reward public sector workers that will never happen. To be that fair work nation you need to pay an appropriate wage to people to deliver your services. We've have now got skilled and dedicated care workers moving jobs to Asda, Tesco to anywhere else other than care as the money is better, the conditions are better, and there's stress and anxiety in these types of jobs."

She raised concerns that recent pay rises awarded to public sector workers south of the Border is meaning that their Scottish counterparts are now falling behind.

"The statistics that we are reviewing at the minute are telling us that in Scotland pay overall in  general terms has fallen by 3%, in England it's fallen by 1% {in real terms]," she said.

"And we know that workers in the lower paid professions within local authorities, hospitals, within the health care setting, within our public sector network have fallen significantly below that because the pay offers have not met the level of inflation. So our members take home pay has fallen."

Ms Macer added that her vision for Unison in the coming years was "to be the biggest, boldest" trade union in Scotland and one that is relevant to all public sector workers.

With polls suggesting that Labour will win the general election, expected next year, The Herald asked Ms Macer whether she believed life for workers would get better.

"I do think under a Labour government that workers' voices will be heard. Right now under the Tory government workers' voices are silent. There is no place for a worker's voice in that environment," she said.

"However, I will hold that Labour government to account as Unison's Scottish Secretary to make sure the worker's voice is heard. And I am not taken anything for granted, no matter whoever is in power or which party is in power."