Barnet UNISON Unified Pay Update 1: 5 July 2016.

Unison strike NLBP 02 web ready

By now all of our members should have received a letter from HR about their individual circumstances.

If you have not received your letter please alert your line manager and contact:

Unified Reward helpline on 0330 606 4444 (option 1) or email barnethrpayroll@capita-services.co.uk or Unified.reward@barnet.gov.uk

We have already started to receive contact from some of our members about the content of the letters.

Our office is collating the names and details and requesting that members provide copies of all communication they have had so far and any documents that they send.

Myths

We have heard some disturbing reports that staff with concerns are being told that if UNISON cannot attend a meeting in relation to their concerns they should still attend that meeting. Firstly we do not recognise this advice as HR is fully supportive of UNISON being part of the process and that includes the most important part: looking after your interests. If you are given a date, you simply need to contact the branch and we will liaise with HR to agree a new date.

Deadlines for Appeals

We understand that members are concerned about meeting deadlines. We have spoken to HR and these deadlines are going to have to be extended as we need to ensure there is adequate time to process everyone’s request.

What are some of the issues being raised?

It is really important we quickly establish what the issues are for you:

  • Grading dispute.

This where a member or a number of members believe the new grade does not reflect the work they do. In this case it is important that you register your right of Appeal and contact the UNISON office.

  • Other Payments

There are reports coming in where members are reporting that they are losing money because of changes to their other payments (not basic pay). This is not part of an appeal process but does need to be addressed as part of Unified pay. We have already alerted HR about these emerging issues. Therefore we need members to follow the same process and contact the branch with all the relevant details.

How will it all start?

As part of the process agreed with HR, there is an informal process which is in place to see if there is a way to resolve the issues without going through a formal appeal hearing. This means that the first meeting will be with you, your UNISON rep, your line manager and HR. For this meeting everyone will need to have all the relevant information in advance of the meeting. Therefore before this meeting takes place you need to meet with your UNISON rep to go through your case and be ready for the informal meeting.

3 things you need to do

  1. Ring the UNISON office on 0208359 2088 or email contactus@barnetunison.org.uk
  2. Provide a copy of your letter with a brief explanation of your concerns together with a copy of your completed appeal form.
  3. Provide a recent copy of your payslip.

 

No To Austerity – No to Racism – Saturday the 16th of July

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After the referendum unite to demand…
No More Austerity – No To Racism – Tories Must Go

 

Barnet Meet Up : Saturday the 16th of July

11.30am Argyll Street

[Beside Oxford Circus Tube]

& look out for Our Banner.

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The Tories have been plunged into crisis by the result of the EU referendum. David Cameron will soon be gone. The Tories will use Brexit to whip up anti-immigrant racism and accelerate their austerity policies and attacks on living standards. George Osborne has already threatened an emergency budget which will hit ordinary people hard.

But it doesn’t have to be this way. The Tories are weaker and more divided than they have ever been. It looks likely that an early General Election will have to be called when Cameron steps down. However people voted in the referendum, we now need to unite and take to the streets to demand an end to austerity policies, to stand up to anti-immigrant racism and show our solidarity with refugees and migrants.

This demonstration, called by the People’s Assembly and Stand Up to Racism, is the positive and united response to the political earthquake on 23 June.

We are not spectators while the Tories fall out. We must make ourselves participants in shaping the future.

We will not let racism grow; we demand an end to austerity.

Support Jeremy Corbyn

“An injury to one is an injury to us all, standing shoulder to shoulder,” all nice words, but Jeremy is being attacked and he now needs our help.

As trade unions we know when someone is a target we stand right behind him publicly, we don’t hide or wait for others. No more rhetoric please get out there and show support for Jeremy.

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Support Jeremy Corbyn

“An injury to one is an injury to us all, standing shoulder to shoulder,” all nice words, but Jeremy is being attacked and he now needs our help.

As trade unions we know when someone is a target we stand right behind him publicly, we don’t hide or wait for others. No more rhetoric please get out there and show support for Jeremy.

13507226_652095034944538_3226718053932788309_n

Support Jeremy Corbyn

“An injury to one is an injury to us all, standing shoulder to shoulder,” all nice words, but Jeremy is being attacked and he now needs our help.

As trade unions we know when someone is a target we stand right behind him publicly, we don’t hide or wait for others. No more rhetoric please get out there and show support for Jeremy.

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LETTER TO THE GUARDIAN IN SUPPORT OF JEREMY CORBYN

Polly Toynbee has inevitably fired a vitriolic salvo against Jeremy Corbyn, holding the supposedly ‘dismal, spineless’ Labour leader responsible for the Brexit vote. The anti-EU vote in many Labour-held constituencies shows not Corbyn’s weakness, but highlights instead the long-term withering of labour movement organisation in wide swathes of England and Wales, which no leader could have reversed in just nine months.
The systematic closure of factories, mines and other union-organised workplaces during the Thatcher years has left a bitter legacy of an atomised working class that has yet to rediscover a progressive voice. New Labour certainly wasn’t that voice and many champions of ‘remain’ in the Parliamentary Labour Party, including Margaret Hodge, Tristram Hunt and Stephen Kinnock, keen to oust Corbyn, might well ask why their own constituents largely backed Brexit.
Still, Toynbee belatedly recognises the importance of effective unions. Alas, I cannot recall her advocating ‘unions into all workplaces, [as] political educators about rights and solidarity’ during the Blair-Brown years, which saw the retention of the most drastic restrictions on collective union action in western Europe. Relentless outsourcing and enfeebled unions, rather than migrant workers, have led to the real decline in living standards for so many.
Ironically, she now chooses to concentrate her fire on the first Labour leader in living memory to actively promote trade unionism. Having attended last week’s Unison conference in Brighton, along with nearly 3,000 others, I know that Corbyn received a very warm reception the day before the referendum vote and nigh unanimous support from delegates as word emerged on Friday afternoon of still another attempted ‘coup’ at a time when both the Tory government and party are in disarray.
George Binette
Camden UNISON Branch Secretary
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