UCU Rejects Pay Offer

UCU members in England are to be balloted over taking industrial action after a special pay conference rejected this year’s pay offer from the Association of Colleges.

Delegates to the pay conference, held on 6 October and attended by UCU branch representatives from colleges across the country, said that the pay offer worth 2.55% over the year was ‘insulting’, and with the increase in retail prices standing at 4.1% for August, it amounts to a pay cut.

The conference also considered a pre-conference branch consultation responded to by over 68% of branches covered by the pay offer. Of these 190 branches, 92 indicated that they wished to accept the offer; 82 indicated rejection of the offer; 2 branches had tied votes and 11 indicated abstention.

UCU branches are now preparing for a national ballot of FE members on taking industrial action.

Rise in Demand For Union Representation

With so much change in the sector at present we are witnessing a big rise in demand for union representation. We have seen 14% increase in the number of cases being handled by our regional officers in the first nine months of this year compared to the same period last year. Grievance cases are up by 21%, bullying by 30% and capability cases by a massive 53%. Not surprisingly, the number of members contacting us due to work related stress has more than doubled.

Commenting on the figures, ACM head of Employment Relations David Green said, “Given the turmoil caused in the sector by so much restructuring and reorganisation these figures come as no surprise. Problems like these are symptoms of the wider instability faced by our members working in further education.”

No Prospect of Early Pay Settlement

Difficult times may be ahead for some branches as their colleges offer pay increases below that currently on the national table in England. As members will know, the Association of Colleges made a two stage offer of 2% from August followed by a further 1% in February 2008.

But we’ve heard of two colleges where considerably less is on offer. Branches at the two institutions are deciding their response but until the national picture is known, the college offers seem premature.

Nationally ACM, ATL and Unison accepted the proposed pay increase, albeit with some degree of reluctance. But UCU’s national executive decided to refer the matter to a special conference that will not be held until 6 October. If the offer is rejected by UCU branch delegates then a ballot for industrial action will follow. The Association of Colleges made it clear that unless all unions are agreed, there will be no settlement.

To put the figures into perspective, the annual rise in average earnings to July 2007 was 3.9% for the whole economy but just 2.8% for workers in the public sector. The inflation rate for the same period stood at 3.8% (RPI) and 1.9% for the consumer prices index.

Banning Facebook An Over-Reaction

The UK’s Facebook users are 3.5 million accidents waiting to happen, warns the TUC in new advice published today (Thursday) for both employers and their staff.

In guidance available on workSMART, its working life website, the TUC advises employers that they should have in place policies covering the use of email and the web, including social networking sites, so that there are no nasty surprises for either employer or employee should things ever go wrong.

The TUC advice suggests that whilst employers are completely within their rights to forbid staff from using sites such as Facebook, MySpace or Bebo in work time, a total ban may be something of an over-reaction.

Instead the TUC suggests that sensible employers, realising that their staff spend much of their waking hours in work and lead busy lives, should be trusted to spend a few minutes of their lunchbreak ‘poking’ their friends or making plans for outside work.

The guidance accepts that employees are paid to do a job, and it is clearly not acceptable for someone to spend hours a day on social networking sites when they should be getting on with their work. However, policies drawn up with the involvement of staff can set out will be and what will not be allowed.

The TUC advice also says that not enough workplaces are being up-front about what they expect from staff in terms of personal conduct when using social networking sites. As a result, a number of employers have disciplined staff for their conduct online, and more cases are likely to follow unless some sensible precautions are taken.

Work is a major part of our lives, and staff have always discussed aspects of their jobs in private with their friends and family, says the TUC. Now that online social networking is becoming mainstream however, many of these private conversations are written on the web, potentially searchable by the public.

Employers may have valid concerns about commercial confidentiality or reputation damage, but in most cases they should not over-react by attempting to stop staff from using such tools to help organise their personal lives. Working together with staff and their unions to devise a sensible conduct policy (for online and offline personal lives) that everyone is aware of, would prevent problems from arising in the first place.

TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber said: “Simply cracking down on use of new web tools like Facebook is not a sensible solution to a problem, which is only going to get bigger. It’s unreasonable for employers to try to stop their staff from having a life outside work, just because they can’t get their heads around the technology. Better to invest a little time in working out sensible conduct guidelines, so that there don’t need to be any nasty surprises for staff or employers.”

The TUC also warns that employers who take equal opportunities in recruitment seriously should not be tempted to check out the profiles of job applicants on Facebook. As only a minority of potential recruits will have public profiles on social networks, using information from this source can give an unfair advantage or disadvantage to certain candidates.

The TUC’s advice to employees can be found at www.worksmart.org.uk/rights/socialnetworking

Teleworking: Inspiration or Isolation

An article in the latest issue of People Management reports that almost a third of UK workers believe they would be more inspired if they worked away from their office.

The figures come from a survey by T-Mobile of 1,025 office-based employees. It found that given the choice, 23 per cent would like to be able to work from home in the future. Perhaps not surprisingly, the survey found that other desirable work locations included the top of a mountain (4 per cent) or a beach (3 per cent). Altogether, 65 per cent of workers said they would like flexible working options in the future.

While working from the beach may be fun, it does have some practical implications. But home working is certainly much more common, in part due to improved access to high speed Internet. Other considerations such as traffic congestion and rising transport costs are also helping to fuel an interest in remote working (teleworking).

A European funded research project, SusTel, was set up in 2002 to look at the sustainability of teleworking. From their UK case studies, the project concluded that teleworking improved work performance, reduced stress and other ill health, and improved quality of life. However, although these benefits outweighed the negatives, they warned that isolation and other communication problems were the main source of dissatisfaction, and that working hours actually increased.

In colleges, we have little evidence of any major shift towards teleworking, although a fair number of members will work from home on an informal basis. However, we suspect that this is largely driven by excessive workloads. We therefore urge members to contact us if teleworking becomes an issue so we can ensure it is introduced by proper agreement.

Wales FE Pay Negotiations Latest

The trade union side met with the employers’ organisation, fforwm, on Wednesday 27^th July to submit the joint pay claim. Both sides agreed to work together to encourage the Welsh Assembly Government (WAG) to fund a pay award at least equal to that being received by school teachers through the teachers pay review body. Expectations are that WAG funding will enable an increase of 2.5% to be made. Further developments will be reported on this blog and on the ACM web site.

Peter Pendle, ACM General Secretary said, “Obviously there is a long way to go with the negotiations, both with fforwm and WAG. Nevertheless, I’m encouraged that the prospects of a reasonable settlement are good.”

Public Sector Pay Rises By 2.8%

While members in England wait on the outcome of consultations over the latest pay offer from the Association of Colleges (AoC), figures from the independent Labour Research Department show that in the three months to May, pay rises in the public sector were running at 2.8% (median). By contrast, the equivalent private sector figure was 3.6%.

Annual retail price inflation in May stood at 4.3 %, or 3.3 % excluding mortgages. According to HM Treasury, figures of 3.5% and 2.7% are forecast for the fourth quarter of 2007.

Interestingly, the Chartered Management Institute national salary survey for 2007 found the average earnings increase for all managers to be 5.3%, with HR managers coming out best at 5.9%.

NJF Pay Offer Accepted

ACM has with some reluctance, agreed to accept the pay offer made to unions at the English National Joint Forum. The decision was taken at a meeting today of the ACM President’s committee after considering the views of branches. Although a number of branches described the offer as derisory, a majority felt that in the current circumstances, there was no prospect of securing anything better.

The Association of Colleges (AoC) offer to the unions was for a 2% rise from 1 August 2007, and a further 1% on current rates from 1 February 2008. ACM General Secretary Peter Pendle said that these figures should be viewed as minimum by branches when it comes to local implementation of the pay deal; and that we would help any branch seeking a higher increase at their college.

The employer’s offer also included:

• To tackle low pay, a rounding up of the second instalment in February for scale points 4 to 11 inclusive (up to £15,057) on the current AoC pay spine to give an overall rise of £500.

• To continue negotiations on a Joint agreement on Training and Development, with an aim to complete by August 2007, but recognising that we are awaiting final legislation.

• To set up an officer’s working party to commence negotiations on a national joint agreement on guidance on work life balance and working time, with a completion date of December 2007.

• The AoC to provide case studies on how colleges use the Advanced Teacher and Training scale.

The other NJF trade unions are currently consulting on the offer and the final outcome may not be known until later this month.

Pay Claims Latest

The following is a progress report on national pay claims in England and Wales…

The Association of Colleges (AoC) yesterday made an improved offer to unions represented on the National Joint Forum in England. On the table is a 2% increase from 1st August 2007 and a further 1% increase on current rates from 1 February 2008. ACM, along with the other trade unions, will now be consulting branches on this offer.

Peter Pendle, ACM general secretary said, “Given the current difficult financial circumstances faced by some colleges, we appreciate the efforts made by the AoC to come up with an improved offer. The ACM President’s committee will agree ACM’s position at its meeting next week after consulting our branches.” Members are also invited to post their comments below.

In Wales the staff-side unions will meet on Thursday to try and draft a joint pay claim. However, given funding settlements and the reluctance of the Welsh Assembly Government to fund any future pay awards, reaching an agreement is by no means guaranteed.

Pay Offer Rejected

The six unions representing staff in English colleges have rejected the Association of College’s (AoC) recent pay offer. At a meeting of the National Joint Forum held on 16 May, the AoC offered a 2% pay rise from 1 August 2007, and a further 0.5% in January 2008.

Commenting on the AoC offer, ACM General Secretary Peter Pendle said, “Our members will be very disappointed with this. It is less than the current rate of inflation, and falls short of our aim of parity with schools. However, we welcome the opportunity for further talks, including clarification of the AoC’s response to the other elements of our claim.”

The joint union claim called for a significant pay rise including some element of a flat rate payment to take account of low pay. Among other items it also called for starting salaries for management and leadership staff to be at least equivalent to those for leadership posts in schools (£34,938 in September 2007), and an agreement to commence negotiations on a national consensus on workloads and work-life balance.

More Action Needed on Bullying

Colleges will be asked to ensure that their workplace bullying policies are robust and that training of staff is made more effective; and ACM branches will be given clear guidance on good practice in order to help them negotiate better policies. The initiative comes following a debate at ACM’s Branch Policy Forum taking place in Birmingham today.

ACM deals with a large number of cases of alleged bullying every year but poor training, poor awareness of the issues, and weak procedures can make life every difficult for everyone involved. In one particular case, an ACM member had to wait over 18 months to seek a resolution to her case, settling just before the date of her tribunal hearing.

The failure of some colleges to take this matter seriously can be seen by the fact that in too many cases, the victim rather than the bully ends up leaving. We also have the problem of mis-placed complaints, where an allegation of bullying and harassment is made as a reaction to the use of disciplinary or capability procedures against an individual.

Delegates at the Policy Forum praised ACM for the work they had already done in this area but said there was still more to do.

A copy of ACM’s model Dignity at Work policy is available on request from the ACM Helpline.

European Agreement on Harassment and Violence

A new Framework Agreement on fighting harassment and violence at work has been signed by the European social partners. The text commits the parties to combat all unacceptable behaviour that can lead to harassment and violence at the workplace.

In particular the agreement provides a method to prevent, identify and manage problems of harassment and violence at work, which

• requires organisations to have a clear statement outlining that harassment and violence at the workplace are not tolerated and specifies the procedure to be followed in case of problems,
• recognises that the responsibility for determining, reviewing and monitoring the appropriate measures rests with the employer, in consultation with workers and/or their representatives,
• allows the provisions of the agreement to deal with cases of violence by third parties where appropriate.

Note: A European Framework Agreement is an outline of the general principles to be implemented in each member state in accordance with the employment relations practice and procedure of that country. The social partners comprise the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) and representative European employers organisations from the private and public sector.

A copy of the framework agreement can be downloaded from the ETUC website.