DOZENS of council workers picketed the constituency office of SNP First Minister John Swinney today as they continue two weeks of targeted strike action over pay.

Unison members recently rejected a Scottish government-backed pay deal with the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (Cosla), which offered non-teaching school staff an extra 67p an hour or 3.6 per cent, whichever was greater.

They are now a week into targeted strike action, which has closed schools and early years centres across the First Minister’s Perthshire North constituency, a move which he branded “utterly unacceptable.”