Independent Workers Union of Great Britain – Universities of London Branch

See below for the full text of a reply from Director Julie Screaton to Jason’s letter of 8 September regarding the Health Education England job cuts

Dear Mr Moyer-Lee

RE: Response to IWGB open letter (8th September 2016)

We note the open letter posted on your website on 8th September 2016 regarding the proposed restructure of the Postgraduate Medical and Dental Education (PGMDE) support functions for London and the South East. I understand that you represent a trade union that is not recognised by the NHS nor the University of London although I am aware that you have some members within the team who are affected by this change

The NHS is changing how it delivers care to the population of this country. Our ambition is to improve services closer to peoples’ homes and to radically improve prevention to reduce demand on services and improve the health of the nation. To help enable the NHS to successfully transform in this way means we have to deliver the services that administer the support for training and recruitment in the most efficient way possible to allow us to increase the amount of funding we provide for doctors, nurses and other NHS staff to deliver better care. This is part of the wider challenge for the NHS to ensure resources are being used in the most effective way for the delivery of frontline care to patients and communities.

The London and Kent, Surrey and Sussex (KSS) post graduate medical and dental education teams came together in Stewart House at the end of 2015 to create the Healthcare Education Team (HET). This coming together of the teams was an important step in creating a more efficient and cost effective support function to our Post Graduate Deans who oversee the training of 16,000 junior doctors. The London team had worked hard to digitise thousands of papers records to save space. This enabled us to move the KSS team from expensive offices in London Bridge into Stewart House, saving thousands of pounds in rent. Together, the two teams under new leadership have invested months in reviewing their business processes to reduce duplication and save time. Our ability to become more efficient was supported further by the fact that London was the last PGMDE office in England to introduce the intrepid computer system already in place across the rest of HEE, having in place 20 year old technology that was no longer fit for purpose.

The consultation on the proposed changes within the PGMDE team ended on 7th September 2016 and no decisions have yet been made. Engagement with our staff has been ongoing for months and will continue. This along with strong partnership working with our recognised trade unions, notably UNISON, is critical to ensuring we develop better ways of working to improve how the team works, the service we provide to doctors in training and releases resources to the front line of the NHS. Any decision we make on the future structure of the teams will take full account of the impact on our staff and stakeholders, including the minimisation of compulsory redundancies.

Yours sincerely

Julie Screaton
Director

After months of negotiating to try and improve information and consultation of employees at the University, yesterday was the final meeting between the five staff negotiating reps and the University.

In the end, the three representatives from Unison and UCU used their majority to vote through a proposal about information and consultation of staff which the IWGB reps rejected as it does not increase representation for ALL employees one bit!

All of our suggestions were accepted, except the key point: that everyone should be allowed to participate in the new ICE forum on an equal basis. The University and the other three representatives have decided that Unison and UCU alone will represent all staff. No other representatives will be allowed into the forum, even as observers.

This final proposal was actually written by University management, not by staff representatives. It’s fairly obvious that a proposal written by the employer doesn’t represent the best deal for staff! Unsurprisingly, it’s pretty much exactly the same as the old consultation arrangements, with some window dressing. The range of voices the University will hear isn’t being expanded at all.

In these negotiations we did everything we could to compromise in order to get a forum that would increase staff participation in a meaningful way. We put forward two different proposals which didn’t exclude anyone, thus extending information and consultation without undermining Unison and UCU’s current position as recognised unions.

However, there is hope! Because the negotiating representatives didn’t agree unanimously, the University’s proposal still has to be ratified by you! It will therefore be put to a ballot in the coming weeks. If you reject it, the University and the staff negotiating representatives will have to get back around the table and negotiate a deal that is fairer to everyone.

You have the power to help us make this change! We’ll be campaigning over the next few weeks, and we will be hoping for your support. We do believe a negotiated solution is possible if you give us a mandate to keep pushing.

The results of the strike ballot over the current pay offer are in, and we can report that the vote was as follows:

Are you prepared to take strike action?

Yes: 66% No: 34%

Are you prepared to take industrial action short of a strike?

Yes: 85.4% No: 14.6%

Turnout was a very respectable 50%, especially given the shortness of the balloting period and the fact that a few members didn’t get them in time!

(In other news, the national HE ballot by UNISON on pay was announced this week – roughly 55% voted YES).

We need to decide at this week’s branch meeting whether we will now proceed with strike action given this mandate. Any strike action will coincide with national UNISON / UCU action.

It’s vital we get feedback from everyone, so please make a special effort to come – 12.30pm, Friday 23 September, IHR Lower Mezzanine Room, 3rd Floor Senate House – come to 3rd floor reception and we’ll come find you, or give Danny a call on 07783719479 if you get lost!

There have been some surprising developments in the negotiations to secure better information and consultation of employees here.

Friday 9 September was the deadline for the submission of final proposals for the new forum. We were expecting to have all the proposals circulated last week, in advance of the meeting to be held on Friday 16 September but, following an enquiry from us on Wednesday, Kim Frost informed us that the Unison/UCU representatives who were elected to represent staff in Levels 7-10 hadn’t written theirs up, despite having had 4 weeks to do so.

He therefore suggested that he would draft it for them!

We objected to this in the strongest terms. It is a clear conflict of interest for any part of the representatives’ work to be delegated to the lead negotiator on the University side. The negotiating representatives were elected to negotiate on employees’ behalf to get the best outcome for staff. This does involve effort and it’s a responsibility that the Levels 1-6 reps have taken very seriously throughout. We have met every deadline, put forward constructive suggestions, and submitted our own proposals as agreed.

We therefore asked that the Levels 7-10 representatives write their own proposal by the end of the week and agreed to postpone the meeting by a week.

Despite this, Kim has now submitted a proposal on behalf of the UNISON/UCU representatives. It accepts all of the changes that we suggested to improve the JNCC, but leaves the membership completely unchanged – just UNISON and UCU representatives. This version doesn’t even have the ‘observer’ status for the IWGB which was proposed at the last meeting.

Thus, Levels 1-6 have voted twice for the IWGB to represent them and, despite this the UoL/UNISON/UCU proposal is that we play no role whatsoever in the modified JNCC.

Obviously we’re not going to agree to anything of this sort! The next meeting has now been rescheduled for this Thursday 22 September, and we will again be strongly making the case for Levels 1-6 staff to be properly represented.

As always, please feel free to email us (Rebecca.Dooley@london.ac.uk) with any thoughts or comments you would like us to make about this or any other aspect of the process.

It has come to the IWGB’s attention that new employees of Cordant and Nurture are being employed on statutory minimum terms and conditions.

We wrote to the Vice-Chancellor and received a reassurance that this was not the case, but having looked into the matter further it is clear that either the University is lying, or it is ignorant of what its own contractors are up to!

See below for Kim Frost’s reply to our original email, and Henry’s response…

If you are on, or know of anyone on, a contract at the University of London which only offers statutory minimum holidays and sick pay let Henry know immediately at henrychangolopez@iwgb.org.uk.

Dear Kim

Many thanks for your reply, and for your confirmation that the University is committed to maintaining the enhanced sick pay and annual leave allowances for outsourced staff.

I would like, however, to flag up three major issues with this.

Firstly, there is no need for an ‘appropriate qualifying period’ before new permanent staff ‘transfer’ to the enhanced allowances.

The Cofely contract which included the enhanced allowances makes provision for a qualifying period – it stipulates that staff qualify for more holidays / more sick leave depending on service.

This is the same as a University of London contract, and is normal practice. It does not make sense to say that staff will be issued with one contract when they commence employment, and then be given a new contract x months later – nor does this provide any guarantee to the employee that this second contract will in fact be supplied.

Secondly, as you will see from the attached contract, which has been issued to a permanent Cordant employee on the University of London contract, you will see that in practice NO MENTION is made of the enhanced allowances (indeed, the contract is of questionable legality full-stop, omitting as it does information relating to pay rates, holidays and sick leave; for these latter two, it simply refers employees to a ‘handbook’).

In other words, Cordant are employing staff on the University of London contract on statutory minimum terms and conditions.

Either the University is aware of this, in which case it is in breach of the commitments you express below, or it is not, in which case Cordant is in breach of its contract with the University.

Thirdly, you will doubtless be aware that Nurture have taken over the landscaping contract. Staff in this area were previously on Cofely contracts with enhanced sick pay and annual leave allowances, but new staff working for Nurture here at the University of London have also been issued with statutory minimum contracts.

This is clearly unacceptable, and unless within a week from today we are given a clear commitment that this situation will be investigated and rectified immediately, we will have no option but to publicise the fact that the University of London’s actions are drastically different from their public boasts.

Best wishes

Henry Chango Lopez

President

IWGB

http://iwgb.org.uk/
—– Original Message —–

From:

“Kim Frost” <Kim.Frost@london.ac.uk>

To:

“henrychangolopez@iwgb.org.uk” <henrychangolopez@iwgb.org.uk>

Cc:

“Vice Chancellor” <Vice-Chancellor@london.ac.uk>, “s.beaumont@nabarro.com” <s.beaumont@nabarro.com>, “emma.burns@rbs.com” <emma.burns@rbscom>, “Steven.Fogel@eu.kwm.com” <Steven.Fogel@eu.kwm.com>, “mark.storey@alcuincapital.com” <mark.storey@alcuincapital.com>, “jane.andrewartha@clydeco.com” <jane.andrewartha@clydeco.com>, “david.latchman@ucl.ac.uk” <david.latchman@ucl.ac.uk>, “master@bbk.ac.uk” <master@bbk.ac.uk>, “r.carter@bbk.ac.uk” <r.carter@bbk.ac.uk>, “principal@qmul.ac.uk” <principal@qmul.ac.uk>, “Paul.Layzell@rhul.ac.uk” <Paul.Layzell@rhul.ac.uk>, “principal@rvc.ac.uk” <principal@rvc.ac.uk>, “Kim Frost” <Kim.Frost@london.ac.uk>, “Chris.palmer@cordantservices.com” <Chris.palmer@cordantservices.com>, “lee.smith@cordantservices.com” <lee.smith@cordantservices.com>, “jasonmoyer-lee@iwgb.co.uk” <jasonmoyer-lee@iwgb.co.uk>, “agata.torres@cordantservices.com” <agata.torres@cordantservices.com>

Sent:

Wed, 24 Aug 2016 13:39:22 +0000

Subject:

Cordant – new contracts of employment
Dear Mr Lopez,

The Vice-Chancellor has asked me to reply to your email of 16 August.

All permanent staff working for Cordant on the University of London contract are entitled to the same enhanced sick pay and annual leave allowances as the existing staff who were recently transferred to them under TUPE from our former contractor.

I understand that all new permanent employees on the University of London contract will be offered employment on a standard Cordant contract and after the appropriate qualifying period will then be given the enhanced T&Cs, including enhanced sick pay and annual leave entitlement. This matches the practice under the previous Cofely contract.

Casual summer season cleaning staff employed for a fixed period have always under the previous Cofely contract been employed on statutory T&Cs and this will continue.

I hope this reassures you that the employment practices of our contractors have not changed and that the terms and conditions offered remain very competitive.

With best wishes

Kim Frost

Director of Human Resources

University of London

Stewart House

32 Russell Square

London

WC1B 5DN

Tel: +44 (0)20 7862 8029    Web: www.london.ac.uk

Please find below a letter from IWGB General Secretary Jason Moyer-Lee to HEE Chief Executive Ian Cumming

Dear Professor Cumming

My name is Jason Moyer-Lee, and I am writing in my capacity as General Secretary of the IWGB trade union.

As you know, yesterday marked the end of the consultation period for HEE PGMDE staff over a proposed restructure which if introduced will see a 41% head count reduction.

Over the last 6 weeks it has become clear what an unmitigated and unnecessary disaster these proposals represent. Each day new stories emerge of the shortage of doctors and dentists. The continuing junior doctors dispute is already massively disrupting this year’s recruitment. And yet you have chosen this moment for a 41% cut in staff, predicated on the introduction of barely tested technology and ill-defined new working structures.

I say chosen because the most astonishing thing is that this has not been forced upon you. Most NHS Chief Executives, when asked by the Secretary of State to make 30% budget cuts by 2020, would have vehemently argued the case for their organisation and its funding. You decided instead to implement the cuts by March 2017, and to weight them so that the impact fell disproportionately on frontline staff.

Let me therefore be clear – if these proposals go ahead, they will have a calamitous impact on HEE employees, NHS trainees and patient safety. And you will be held publicly accountable for this.

This process has already begun. The IWGB is a small union, albeit one with a rapidly growing membership in HEE. However, as those who witnessed our 3 Cosas campaign at the University of London will testify, we are capable of making plenty of noise. We have campaigned vociferously against these cuts from the outset, and will continue to gather signatures, alert stakeholders and protest at recruitment events. Should it come to industrial action we will back staff all the way.

Rest assured that this campaign will continue until any plans for compulsory redundancies are dropped. Now is the time to step back from the precipice and stand up to Mr Hunt. You can fight for a reasonable funding settlement for HEE and avoid being remembered as the man who destroyed NHS education – and we will be right behind you.

Best wishes

—

Dr. Jason Moyer-Lee

General Secretary

IWGB

Our branch secretary Catherine Morrissey has responded to the earlier email from KIm Frost re the implementation of this year’s pay award.

See her email, and Kim’s below:

Hi all,

You may have noticed it’s the annual ‘attempt to disrupt HE pay strikes’ email from Kim!

It now seems a permanent fixture of the HE pay negotiations that the employers make an insultingly low offer, unions object, the employers increase their offer by an even more insulting amount (this year the figure is 0.1%) and rush to ‘implement’ this generous increase in the hopes that employees will be fooled into thinking that’s that.

Well, not this year!

Don’t let Kim’s email fool you – the pay dispute is not over, and action can get us a better offer! None of the unions have accepted the offer of 1.1%, so the pay dispute is still live.

If we want more, we have to push for it – so please, vote yes for strike and return your ballot papers straight away!

If anyone hasn’t received a ballot paper yet, please contact me or Danny for help.

Thanks!

Catherine

Catherine Morrissey

Secretary, University of London IWGB
https://iwgb.wordpress.com/

Dear all,

I am writing to update you on the outcome of this year’s pay negotiations.

The University and Colleges Employers’ Association (UCEA) made a final pay offer providing a 1.1% increase on base pay at points 8 and above, with more on lower points, at the end of April and the dispute procedure of the national negotiations concluded in mid-May.

We believe that this is a fair final pay offer; it exceeds inflation, compares favourably with pay awards elsewhere and rightly targets larger increases to those on the lower pay rates. We have therefore accepted the recommendation of UCEA that institutions should now implement the award. The final pay offer is available here.

I am therefore writing to let you know that we will be implementing the award of 1.1%, with more on points below point 8, in September pay and backdated to 1 August.

Best wishes,

Kim Frost

Director of Human Resources

University of London

Stewart House

32 Russell Square

London

WC1B 5DN

Tel: +44 (0)20 7862 8029    Web: www.london.ac.uk

IWGB members and other affected staff have submitted a series of Freedom of Information requests to Health Education England as a result of the ongoing PGMDE consultation process whereby 41% of staff stand to lose their jobs.

The requests, which are due responses in the next couple of weeks, are below. We hope you will agree that they are questions well worth asking, and that the responses should be extremely interesting!

If you would like to submit an FOI yourself, just contact hee.foia@nhs.net.

Under the Freedom of Information Act can you provide how much HEE London and Kent Surrey and Sussex (KSS) spent on agency staff in the financial year 2015/16?

Under the Freedom of Information Act can you provide the equality impact assessments HEE London and the South East have carried out in relation to their current restructuring proposals?

Under the Freedom of Information Act I would like to request the expense that the new IT Systems for HEE London and the South East is estimated to cost after all new systems have been implemented?

Under the Freedom of Information Act I would like to request evidence that the proposed 41% headcount staff reduction at HEE London and the South East will improve the service that the organisation delivers.  

Under the Freedom of Information Act can you provide the contingency plan that HEE London and the South East have in place if the new structure that they are proposing results in a deterioration of the service that the department provides?

Under the Freedom of Information Act can you provide the rationale for reaching 30% cost savings by April 2017 when the organisation is not required to make these savings until 2020?

Under the Freedom of Information Act can you provide the rationale for implementing cost savings for HEE London and the South East first rather than any other HEE region?

Under the Freedom of Information Act can you provide risk assessments that have been undertaken by HEE London and the South East on the impact the new proposed structure will have on patient safety?

Under the Freedom of Information Act can you state exactly which external stakeholders you have informed of the ongoing consultation and expected 41% headcount reduction in staff?

Could Health Education England disclose all relevant emails, meeting minutes and other information relating to the decision which led to Ian Cumming’s letter to the Trust Chief Executives dated 15 February 2016 (https://www.hee.nhs.uk/sites/default/files/documents/IC%20Letter%20to%20Chief%20Executives_150216.pdf)?