Brief history to this grading dispute.

On 25 April 2024 at the formal meeting with the former Chief Executive in the JNCG about the agreement to move grades A to E starting from 1 April 2024. It was agreed that Barnet Council would update UNISON on this matter in a few days.

It is worth noting in January 2024 when the trade unions were informed that Chief Executive and Director of Resources had agreed to the changes and payment from 1 April 2024, we were told that implementation would not take place until September due to concerns about Oracle, but we were assured that the payments would be backdated to 1 April 2024.

In March 2024, Barnet Council HR informed Head Teachers of the proposals to move their staff on Grades A-E. Feedback from Head Teachers was that they were supportive of this decision.

On 19 July 2024 the trade unions were formally notified that there would be a delay and the Council “would be in a position to implement changes to grades A-E towards the end of this calendar year.”

On 16 September 2024 at a formal meeting with the interim Chief Executive UNISON was informed that Barnet Council would not be able to fund this proposal and that it would not be backdated.

Barnet Council stated they want the implementation date to be from 1st April 2025 they went on to say they were waiting to hear of local government finance settlement before categorically 100% confirming this.  If the budget on 30th Oct was bad news for local government financing, then this date cannot be guaranteed adding that once the budget for 25/26 is set, a firm implementation date will be confirmed with trade unions.

Following this meeting UNISON organised workplace meetings of our members which led to members submitting signed collective letters requesting that the decision not to implement from 1 April 2024 be reconsidered.

• On 23 September 2024 UNISON emailed to signed letters from hundreds of our members asking the interim chief executive to reconsider.
• On 17 October UNISON emailed the interim chief executive if they were going to respond to staff.
• On 18 October the interim chief executive emailed UNISON to say they were speaking with Executive Director of Environment and proposed that the communication would be sent at the end of the month.
• On 18 October UNISON confirmed that would work as we had a mass meeting of members on 6 November 2024.
• On Wednesday 6 November 2024 UNISON attended a mass meeting of members where they confirmed that they had not received any communication from you.

At that meeting our members were clearly upset over the handling of this matter and requested that UNISON record a trade dispute over failure to honour an agreement to implement the uplift from the 1 April 2024.

On 6 November UNISON emailed the interim chief executive formally registering a dispute adding that UNISON was still open to meetings to find a resolution, but confirming that we are now beginning UNISON’s internal processes for applying for an industrial action ballot

Late on Friday 8 November 2024 UNISON received the following memo which we are sharing as a hard copy and via email to our members to read and report back to our next mass meeting on Wednesday 4 December 2024, 1^st Floor in new building at the following times.

• 5.45-6.15 am
• 6.30- 7 am

PLEASE READ MEMO FROM INTERIM CHIEF EXECUTIVE BY CLICKING ON LINK BELOW.

https://www.barnetunison.me.uk/wp/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/241108-GradesA2E-LetterResponse-CS.pdf

End.