- Conference
- 2014 Police & Justice Conference
- Date
- 24 June 2014
- Decision
- Carried
Conference welcomes the work done by UNISON, and sister unions National Association of Probation Officers (Napo) and GMB, to negotiate a staff transfer and protections agreement for probation members, that protects national collective bargaining into the National Probation Service (NPS) and the 21 Community Rehabilitation Companies (CRCs).
Conference also acknowledges the protections for the continuation of funding for national and local facility time that are contained in the staff transfer agreement, but recognises the threat to facility time contained within the Cabinet Office guidelines on trade union facilities.
Conference is aware that both national collective bargaining and facility time are likely to come under pressure in both NPS and in the CRCs, as the new delivery bodies struggle with cuts to funding and the inevitable pressures that privatisation of the CRCs will place on operating budgets.
Conference therefore calls on the Service Group Executive to seek to defend national terms and conditions going forward in both NPS and the CRCs by:
1)Working in partnership with sister trade unions Napo and GMB;
2)Strongly pursuing a decent pay rise for both NPS and CRC staff for 2014 in line with the NNC pay claim for an above inflation pay rise;
3)Making sure that UNISON’s ‘Worth It’ campaign is mainstreamed in all our pay campaigning work for 2014;
4)Maintaining the pressure on the new employers to ensure that the NNC pay ranges do not perpetuate potential pay discrimination;
5)Alerting potential CRC owners to the obligations to maintain national collective bargaining if they buy a CRC;
6)Campaigning against the emergence of a two tier workforce in CRCs;
7)Agreeing new arrangements to protect trade union facility time at both local and national level in line with the staff transfer and protections agreement;
8)Recruiting and organising at local employer level to ensure that UNISON is in the strongest position possible to defend members’ interests going forward;
9)Agreeing, following consultation with regions and branches, appropriate branch arrangements for probation members for the future.