- Conference
- 2012 National Delegate Conference
- Date
- 1 January 2012
- Decision
- Carried
Conference deplores the attacks on trade union facility time made by organisations such as Taxpayers Alliance (TPA) and the newly formed Trade Union Reform Campaign (TURC). Conference believes that the poorly conducted ‘research’ conducted by the Taxpayers Alliance, claiming that £113m was spent on trade unions, represented nothing more than an ideological attack on public service workers and their union voice. The formation of the Trade Union Reform Campaign, launched to coincide with the November 30 Pensions Justice Day of Action, provides a vehicle for this attack to continue, supported by the Conservative party. Conference notes that on the same day that a million UNISON members took industrial action to defend their pensions, Prime Minister David Cameron made the inflammatory statement that a review on trade union facility time should take place, with a particular focus on the number of representatives on full time release in the public sector.
Conference regrets that national facility time reviews have been started in the Civil Service and will spread to other parts of the public sector. Already individual branch officers and facility time are under direct attack in many employers, including Swindon Council amongst others, and Conference applauds the fight back at all levels under way. Conference therefore welcomes Labour MPs marshalling in January 2012 to defeat a Ten Minute Rule Bill from Jesse Norman MP that sought to ban public sector facility time and acknowledges the fact that 17 Liberal Democrat MPs also voted against too.
Conference notes that both TPA and TURC masquerade as ‘grassroots’ organisations, but in reality are nothing more than a front for right wing groups to attack trade unions, especially in the public sector.
Conference is aware that the Taxpayers’ Alliance has submitted Freedom of Information requests to every public sector employer, requests for complete breakdowns of our facility time and the cost of this to the employer and therefore the tax payer.
Information which is being used to justify all facility time being withdrawn; for branches to be completely self-funding.
Conference is aware of the disparity between the wealth of branches – big county branches with thousands of members versus small branches with membership in the low hundreds.
Conference knows that once again the government is trying to divide and rule – the big branches may be able to be self-sufficient but all other branches would cease to exist.
Conference will not let that happen.
Conference will not allow this government to break us down.
Conference applauds the work of the TUC and the independent research conducted by the University of Hertfordshire – Facility Time for Union Reps – separating fact from fiction. This report highlighted the many inaccuracies in the TPA report, but also showed the considerable benefits to the taxpayer as a result of trade union facility time, previously highlighted in a government report in 2007.
These benefits include:
1) savings due to lower levels of dismissal;
2) higher employee retention;
3) lower levels of employment tribunals;
4) reduction in workplace injuries and workplace related injuries.
The TUC report calculated that these savings could have been worth from £267m to £701m in 2010 alone.
Conference notes that many significant private sector employers specifically provide paid support for union reps because they recognise the value this brings them in terms of good industrial relations, effective and informed consultation and improved productivity.
Conference applauds the tireless work undertaken by volunteer UNISON reps, carrying out often demanding, complex and stressful roles in workplaces across the UK, with TUC surveys suggesting that much of this time is not actually paid for by employers but is made up of unpaid hours of their own time.
Conference believes, however, that we cannot be complacent about these attacks and must mount a robust campaign to defend our members’ right to a strong workplace voice.
In addition to facility time, Conference is concerned that future attacks may be aimed at trade union use of DOCAS facilities to efficiently collect subscription income. In light of this, Conference reasserts the importance of the union obtaining and maintaining accurate and up to date membership information.
Conference therefore resolves to:
a) defend attacks against facility time and ensure that facility time is a priority bargaining issue for our branches, regions and service groups;
b) co-ordinate a campaign driven through every branch to contact MPs, local councillors, and public authority leaders;
c) Work with Labour Link and the General Political fund to build a parliamentary network to develop understanding and awareness of the economic, social and workplace benefits;
d) lead, in partnership with the TUC, a cross-union media campaign;
e) monitor and provide robust focused rebuttals of all campaigning avenues pursued by the TPA, TURC and allied groups;
f) build a wide pool of case studies and media stories to demonstrate the value and effectiveness of facilities time to individual union members and to companies and organisations;
g) challenge the accuracy of misleading reports or statements designed specifically to attack trade union representatives rights;
h) continue making the case for paid time off for trade union representatives, particularly in the current climate of redundancies, restructuring and privatisation;
i) encourage branches to work locally on binding facility time agreements with employers;
j) ensure that the defence of facility time is included in the work of the union’s Million Voices campaign and in activist education courses;
k) work with Labour Link and the General Political Fund to encourage all employers to commit to upholding and improving where needed, existing facility time agreements;
l) to recognise the urgency of this threat and actively and publicly decry and challenge the coalition’s overt agenda to decimate unionism;
m) in support of this to request immediate funding for research to support our challenge;
n) to report back to National Delegate Conference 2013.