Industrial action at Shropshire Council could move a step closer say UNISON

Shropshire Council management met this week with Trade Union leaders to continue negotiations about changes to staff terms and conditions of employment, to cut costs by millions of pounds a year.

The meeting followed a 90-day consultation with staff and the unions on proposals to introduce more flexibility and greater productivity in service delivery in the face of a total budget cut for the Council of £76 million over the next three years.

At its meeting tomorrow, the Council’s Cabinet will be asked to recommend that a Collective Agreement is sought on the changes, which are to be put in place from October this year. If agreed by full Council at its meeting on 23 June 2011, the changes will include a pay cut of over 5% for all Council staff, as well as various other changes to terms and conditions, to create an even more productive and flexible workforce.

The Chief Executive is asking councillors to take this approach in preference to cutting costs through large-scale redundancies, which would involve the loss of at least 400 jobs and have a detrimental effect on frontline services for local people.

If there is no formal agreement with the Trade Unions on these changes by the time of the Council meeting, permission will be sought from Council to terminate the employment of all Council staff, and to re-engage them on the revised terms, in October. When fully implemented over the next two years, the changes will cut the Council’s staffing costs by at least £7 million.

Chief Executive, Kim Ryley said: “The consultation period has been extremely fruitful and constructive. As a result of what our staff are telling us, we have made substantial changes to our original position, and I believe that we now have a set of proposals which will save the Council a significant amount of money and provide more flexible services for our residents, while safeguarding jobs at the Council to provide those vital services.

“We have also held regular, and helpful, discussions with the unions throughout this period, and have taken on board their concerns in developing our final position. Like us, the unions want to do what they can to protect essential public services, but the only alternative to our proposals is large-scale redundancy, if we are to meet the shortfall in Government funding over the next three years.”

The Council’s Leader, Councillor Keith Barrow, said: “Our staff come to work every day to provide essential services to the people of Shropshire. I want the Council to continue to be a good employer, so that we can carry on attracting the best people to deliver these services. I think that the revised proposals are evidence that we have listened to staff and responded to their concerns. These are tough times economically, and we face difficult choices. These changes will cut our costs and avoid large-scale compulsory redundancies. This is good for our services, as well as for our local economy, and therefore good for the people of Shropshire.”

The consultation sought the views of staff and unions on proposed changes to working hours to meet changing patterns of customer demand, as well as to allowances and standby, call-out and overtime payments. Changes to office hours, sick pay and annual leave arrangements were also up for discussion.

During the consultation period the Council set up a Staff Forum, where staff could discuss how the proposals would affect how they provided services on the ground, and would affect them personally. The Forum was set up to give a voice to the 70% of staff who are not Trade Union members, and many of its suggestions are reflected in the revised proposals now going to Cabinet for a decision.

Rick Tudor, UNISON’s Regional Organiser for Shropshire, said: “Inflation is rocketing at 5.2% and people are finding it increasingly difficult to make ends meet. The decision of Shropshire Council to impose a 5.4% cut to all members of staff is cruel and particularly spiteful given that local government workers are already facing a two year pay freeze.

"UNSON members carry out vital services on behalf of the residents of Shropshire and their dedication is being rewarded by further attacks on their term and conditions or even redundancy.

"Our members are extremely angry and upset over both the proposals and the secrecy involved regarding the reduction to salaries for our hard working members

"We will continue to campaign for our members and cannot rule out taking industrial action to protect our member’s terms and conditions”.