Category: Local

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Please note community petition addressed to Capita Plc Chief Executive Paul Pindar.

To view and sign the petition click this link http://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/capita-keep-our-jobs-in-barnet

Below are the details of the petition

“Dear Mr Pindar

As Chief Executive, you will be aware of the Capita Plc consultation with former Barnet Council staff starting on Monday 7 October 2013. You will know the Capita Plc proposal means hundreds of jobs are to be lost to Barnet, with no certainty that these will be recreated elsewhere in that community, resulting in a loss of local knowledge and another severe blow to the local economy that will have a negative impact on any remaining Council staff, residents and local traders. In the current economic climate this is unacceptable. I would ask that you directly intervene and provide a commitment that a new service solution is found that both protects and creates jobs in the community they serve.”

Why is this important?

In August 2013, Barnet Council signed a ten year £320 million contract with Capita Plc to take over the provision of the following services take over the running of the council’s back office services which includes customer services, human resources, finance and payroll, IT, revenues and benefits, estates, corporate procurement and commercial services.

Capita Plc proposed solution is to provide these services in Capita Call centres elsewhere in the UK which will ultimately lead to approximately 350 jobs losses to our community and upwards of 150 redundancies in Barnet.

We are passionate about local public services and believe people providing them have local knowledge and are accountable to the residents of Barnet. Not only that but local job losses will have a negative impact on our local economy as working people become jobless with a reduced income to spend in the local economy.

Information links

1. UNISON call on Capita to reverse mass redundancies in Barnet.  http://www.barnetunison.me.uk/?q=node/1273

2. Barnet UNISON Press Release: “From hard working families to ‘scroungers’ – Capita redundancies.  http://www.barnetunison.me.uk/?q=node/1272

3. Barnet Council publish Capita contract. http://www.barnetunison.me.uk/?q=node/1268

4. Barnet and Capita – some unusual contractual conditions?

http://spendmatters.co.uk/barnet-and-capita-some-unusual-contractual-conditions/

 

5. Union slams lack of transparency as Capita prepares to move 150 jobs out of Barnet http://ning.it/1fmk9tc

To view proposal click here

To view proposal click here

To view report click here

To view proposal click here

To view proposals click here

London Living Wage to be implemented for Barnet Council staff

In the same Barnet Press article it reports:

“Mr Cornelius also said that salaries of the remaining in-house employees would be brought up to the living wage, which in London is £8.55 an hour, £2.36 above the national minimum wage.”

This is a GOOD NEWS story for all workers working for Barnet and earning less than the Living Wage.

Four years ago our branch tried to convince the Council that staff working for private contractors (at this time it was cleaners) should be on the London Living Wage. UNISON took the matter to the then Leader of the Council Mike Freer. A promise was made to look into the issue but nothing was done. At the time no council staff were earning less than the London Living Wage.

But now, four years on nearly a thousand workers are earning less than the London Living Wage.

You can read the details in a report going to the Remuneration Committee on 14 October 2013 see HERE

This is clear evidence of how fast the cost of living crisis and freeze on pay has impacted on the lives of council workers. In the Council report it states

“3. CORPORATE PRIORITIES AND POLICY CONSIDERATIONS

3.1. The Council believes that no-one should do a hard day’s work for less than they can live on, and that all our staff deserve to be paid at least the Living Wage. Council considers that if everyone in London on low pay were paid at least the living wage it could potentially save the government money by increasing the tax base and reducing spend on welfare benefits.

3.2. In addition, the Council believes that the added benefit to the Council of paying at least the living wage include increased productivity and lower staff turnover, which would reduce recruitment costs.”

It is our view that all employers who currently pay their staff below the London Living Wage should recognise the benefits and make plans to adopt the above statement.

Our branch will be writing to all of the employers delivering public services in Barnet to join Barnet Council implement the London Living Wage. We will be asking the Council to work with UNISON to ensure contractors for example cleaning service are all paid the London Living Wage.

If you have never heard about the London Living Wage and want to know more read here

“Council may be forced to outsource additional services, warns leader”

(Barnet Press 3 October 2013)

“THE leader of Barnet Council says that the authority will continue to outsource and make funding cuts if the government continues to slash local authority budgets after the 2015 general election.” More here

On Tuesday 1 October  UNISON attended a meeting to discuss the One Barnet Programme. Some of our members may be aware that the programme was split into Wave One & Wave Two. The meeting formalised the closing of Wave One with the caveat that there would be a lessons learnt report produced with an opportunity for the trade unions to contribute. We were informed that Wave Two has already started which includes CCTV service, Registars Services, Mortuary Service all of which will no doubt be outsourced at some point in time.

The latest big project for Wave Two is the Education Service or what used be known as the Local Education Authority (LEA). This service has had some pretty vicious cuts in the past but has now been lumped together with all the services that have remained in Education in readiness for the One Barnet treatment.

I reported back to the meeting that staff already believe it is simply a matter of time before they are outsourced. Many workers in our Education service are already aware that Capita won the contract to deliver LEA services on behalf of Staffordshire County Council late last year. More recently Capita won another big contract in Swindon to deliver the following services: administrative support and reception-based duties on behalf of the Children’s Integrated Service Localities teams, which includes education welfare, youth engagement, health visiting support, targeted mental health services and educational psychology.

So, the news headline will not be a shock to anyone working for the Council. The Commissioning model does not tolerate in house service delivery. It doesn’t matter whether the service is high performing, low cost, value for money, the ‘die has been cast’ and outsourcing is the ‘only game in town’.

It is only right to point out Streetscene services have remained in-house. This weekend sees the return of the Recycling services from May Gurney. However a straw poll of members working down the deport would reveal that no one believes that this services will be still in-house once Mill Hill Depot is sold by December 2016

UNISON does not support ideological adherence to One Barnet outsourcing and will continue to support our members and public services in Barnet.

 

Monday 7 October 2013

Dear Mark

Re: Capita Customer and Support Group (CSG) Redundancy consultation

I am writing to you in your role as Partnership Director, Capita which I understands covers both contracts with Barnet Council. I am taking this unusual step to make a direct plea to you and your senior management team to pause and consider if there is a possibility that the proposals which will be set out to staff and the trade unions today can be changed.

I have made it my business to study Capita Plc and there can be no doubt that your organisation continues to enjoy massive financial success as you win contract after contract across the public sector. In an article I read earlier this week in the Guardian it stated “Capita’s win rate is currently better than one in two.”

I know from other contracts Capita have won that there has been a commitment to deliver jobs in the local community. I recognise that this was not stipulated in the OJEU notice but the sheer size of job losses means it would be seriously negligent of UNISON not to try to engage your organisation in consultation about delivering a different service delivery model; one which would lead to maintaining and growing jobs in our community. Considering that already almost a third of the posts were vacant on the point of the transfer must provide financial opportunities to revise some of your proposals which would lead to more redundancies.

Today I along with a number of UNISON reps will be attending a number of Capita CSG service presentations to staff which will detail the Capita CSG transformation plan which unfortunately will mean redundancies for a large number of staff. This news will come as no surprise to staff as this outcome was made known last November 2012 once Capita was named as preferred bidder. In the TUPE consultations it became a little clearer as to where the redundancies would be made both through re-location and restructuring of services.

At some point today Capita will provide details of each transformation plan to the trade unions and begin a 90 day consultation. I have had an opportunity to study the Capita Transformation plan which sets out the plan to transfer & restructure services. Unless I have misunderstood the purposes by which Capita are consulting it has always been UNISON’s view that this is still a proposal. Indeed in the TUPE consultation it was pointed out to UNISON on a number of occasions that these were proposals and as such Capita could not enter into consultation until after transfer.

It is UNISON’s view that meaningful consultation must be undertaken at a time when proposals are still at a formative stage. It must include sufficient reasons for particular proposals to allow those consulted to give intelligent consideration and an intelligent response; adequate time must be given for this purpose; and the product of consultation must be conscientiously taken into account when the ultimate decision is taken. It is therefore our view that there is opportunity in the consultation period to be able to provide a considered response once we have all the facts which may impact on Capita’s final decision with regards the future for CSG services.

If this is not your understanding of the consultation process please can you let me know?

In the meantime please provide the following:

· The current CSG staffing establishment number including all filled & vacant posts

· A commitment that no CSG posts will be transferred to any of the proposed relocations before the end of consultation.

· A written response to UNISON’s request for CSG staff at risk of redundancy to be given access to vacant jobs within Barnet Council and Capita Plc.

· A copy of each of the proposed transformation plans for each of the services areas.

I look forward to hearing back from you in due course.

Yours sincerely

John Burgess

Branch Secretary Barnet UNISON

CC: Paul Pindar (Capita Chief Executive), Dave Prentis (UNISON General Secretary), Richard Cornelius (Leader, Barnet Council), Andrew Travers (Chief Executive, Barnet Council), UNISON members.