Barnet UNISON

Why Your Choice Barnet (YCB) Care workers are taking strike action

In the local press the YCB chief executive said “The rates of pay for Adult Social Care are a national issue”,  Yes we agree There is a national social care crisis AND Doncaster Care UK dispute is evidence of this BUT there is a local crisis in relation to how care workers are treated.

To those who want to know what has driven care workers to take strike action it is important you understand the perverse relationship with Barnet “Commissioning” Council and Your Choice Barnet (YCB). The current funding arrangements between Barnet Council and Your Choice Barnet are the cause of this dispute and that is why we are requesting Barnet Council to come to the table in order to try and find a resolution to this dispute.

It is important to note Barnet Council own Your Choice Barnet yet at the same time they are the architects of its current critical financial crisis facing YCB. If Barnet Homes had not provided Your Choice Barnet a £1 million loan (last year) then the service would have folded. On top of securing a £1 million loan, YCB cut our members terms & conditions and almost a third of the workforce were made redundant. However the ongoing financial crisis meant that six months later YCB came back for more.

Breaking News: Last week Barnet UNISON made a request to talk to Barnet Council about the current YCB dispute, unfortunately we were informed they would not speak with UNISON because the Chief Executive had told staff in a meeting last week the dispute had nothing to do with Barnet Council.

Barnet UNISON begs to differ. Over the last six months we have had detailed discussions with YCB in order to try and find a resolution. Having seen the financial accounts and understood the financial arrangements with Barnet Council we made the following proposals which we believe would give YCB a fighting chance to survive:

1. Barnet Homes writes off the £1 million loan.

2. Barnet Council stop penalising YCB for ‘no shows’.

3. Barnet Council pays up front to YCB in order to help the cash flow situation.

4. Barnet Council pays the going rate for the services being offered.

5. Barnet Council conducts an immediate investigation as to why Adult Social care services have referred only a handful of referrals in the last 2 and half years.

6. Senior management and other Service Level Agreement costs imposed on YCB are reduced.

7. YCB & Barnet Council find a more efficient way to invoice for services. The current arrangement is that Barnet Group invoice Barnet Council then YCB invoice Barnet Group.

8. YCB is allowed to independently procure its own support services and not be forced to use Capita CSG services.

 

To end this dispute and to support services for adults with disabilities Barnet Council must and should come to the table.

When is failure not a failure……..

“Commercial risk ultimately remains with the Council and in the unlikely event of failure, the services will need to be brought back in-house.” (Source: Page 57 of the Business Case approved at Cabinet Resources Committee 24.May 2011 http://j.mp/WtVImC)

Since the service transferred out of the Council in February 2012

· Your Choice Barnet (YCB) had to take a £1 million loan from Barnet Homes (100% owned by Barnet Council)

· Your Choice Barnet do not have the money to pay back a £1 million loan

· Barnet Council are holding back payment of hundreds of thousands pounds every year from Your Choice Barnet

· Barnet Council are not referring new business to Your Choice Barnet Unison

· A third of the workforce were made redundant last year

This promise made in a public council committee meeting and it is our view YCB is failing and as they said in the committee “commercial risk remains with the Council” in which case they must take part in negotiations with Barnet UNISON & YCB.

 

Why we must ‘care for’ our care workers and stop the attacks on them

Care workers have been submitted to devastating treatment from Commissioners who wield their power through contracting out services. I say this because when we raise the issue of terms & conditions for our members working for the contractors, the contractors respond by saying it is the ‘Council who are responsible.’

In Barnet we have a dispute known as the Your Choice Care Workers dispute which you can read about here and here.  

But there is a wider issue that goes beyond Barnet Council, Social Care is in crisis but not just about the cost but what it is doing to the quality of service delivery. The key issue commissioning continues to ignore is that without staff there is no service and the race to the bottom will only lead to further scandals and allegations of abuse. Incredibly there are some people who believe that lower wages including zero hours contracts guarantees quality services!

Some members of the public condemn care workers for having the temerity to stand up to the ongoing attacks to their terms and conditions. These ignorant people and I mean ignorant try to argue care work is not an important role and are first to call care workers greedy for not accepting cuts to their pay.

They will condemn the Doncaster Care UK care workers and they will condemn Your Choice Barnet care workers.

BUT where would we be without care workers?

I would argue that the way we treat those who provide care is a measure of what sort of society we aspire to be. Social Care is in a crisis, not just because of funding but I believe because of the way we treat the staff who deliver the care.

How can it be right that care work pays less then working behind a bar or in a supermarket?

We will at some point all rely on a care worker whether it is for ourselves or for someone we love and cherish. The level of trust we place on the care worker is critical to the quality of care required by the person needing support.

Providing care is exhausting work both physically and mentally. It is critically important that those providing care are provided with the best training, support and supervision to ensure the care they provide is of the highest quality.

BUT ‘Commissioning’ has undermined the role of the care worker, it has led to zero hours culture, it has led to the ‘15 minutes’ of care culture where home care workers are forced to provide 15 minutes of care and move on to their next client.

The advocates of the commissioning model will throw up their arms and protest they have brought value for money and greater innovation but the facts are there to see

· ‘Social care commissioners should ditch zero-hours contracts’

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/mar/25/social-care-ditch-zero-hours-contracts

· ‘300,000 people on zero hours contracts in social care alone’

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/300000-people-on-zero-hours-contracts-in-social-care-alone-8688796.html

· ‘Unscrupulous employers exploiting workers through zero-hours contracts’

http://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/scottish-affairs-committee/news/report-zero-hours-contracts-/

· ‘Are 1 in 5 social care workers on zero-hours contracts?’

https://fullfact.org/factchecks/social_care_workers_zero_hours_contracts-29039

· ‘Ending the abuse of zero-hours contracts’

 

http://www.tuc.org.uk/sites/default/files/TUC%20final%20response%20to%20BIS%20consultation%20on%20zero-hours%20contracts.pdf

The only way for YCB to be financially viable would be if: 

1. Barnet Homes writes off the £1 million loan.

2. Barnet Council stop penalising YCB for ‘no shows’.

3. Barnet Council pays up front to YCB in order to help the cash flow situation.

4. Barnet Council pays the going rate for the services being offered.

5. Barnet Council conducts an immediate investigation as to why Adult Social care services have referred only a handful of referrals in the last 2 and half years.

6. Senior management and other Service Level Agreement costs imposed on YCB are reduced.

7. YCB & Barnet Council find a more efficient way to invoice for services. The current arrangement is that Barnet Group invoice Barnet Council then YCB invoice Barnet Group.

8. YCB is allowed to independently procure its own support services and not be forced to use Capita CSG services.

See background to the dispute below:

Background

YCB imposed a 9.5% cut in pay to all their staff starting from 1 April 2014. Barnet UNISON carried out an indicative ballot to ascertain if members wanted to accept the 9.5% cut or if they wanted to be formally balloted. UNISON members overwhelming voted to be balloted for strike action.

UNISON organised a legal strike ballot and members voted 100% for strike action this was an amazing result.

ACAS became involved and UNISON agreed to attend a meeting together with ACAS and YCB. At this meeting an agreement was reached that staff would have their pay reinstated for just one month, whilst further negotiations took place.

These further discussions elicited more financial information in an attempt to ascertain the financial viability of YCB and to see if savings could be made from ‘expenditure/overheads’.

We asked them to look at savings across the following headings:

· Senior management costs

· Financial services

· Accommodation costs

· IT services

· Business Improvement costs

· Renegotiate the terms of the £1 million loan from Barnet Homes.

YCB then made a revised offer of a 8.31% pay cut for our members, further reductions were offered if staff wanted to lose some of their annual leave. Our members were given a detailed chart showing the further reductions of the 9.5% depending on how much annual leave they lost.

On a 73% turnout 90% voted in favour of taking action to reinstate their pay. Actually more members took part in this third ballot in three months and more voted for strike action.

For more details read Your Choice Barnet (YCB) “The real deal” here