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UNISON CITY OF EDINBURGH BRANCH
NURSERY NURSE DISPUTE
OUTCOME OF CONCILIATION AT ACAS - COUNCIL'S
FINAL OFFER
On 18 May 2004 your UNISON negotiators, the
council's negotiators and an ACAS conciliator
met for over seven hours to try to achieve a
resolution to the dispute. The attached offer
is the result of this meeting.
While there are some improvements and clarifications,
It is with great regret that I have to report
that there is no improvement in the main grade.
What was achieved took a long time and considerable
work but it is not what you or your negotiators
would have aspired to.
Despite this, your negotiators now feel we
have arrived at a position where we must now
reluctantly recommend that you vote to accept
this offer to resolve the dispute. This is for
the following reasons:-
1. After over a year of industrial action and
11 weeks of continuous strike action, you have
moved the council from Point 14 to Point 24
at the top of the grade as their final offer.
However, despite the continuing indefinite action,
we have been unable to move the council further.
2. Our best assessment is that the only alternative
is a further long and indefinite period of strike
which, even then, is unlikely to force a move
in the council's position. Even if it eventually
did, it would be at disproportionate cost to
members in loss of earnings. With the summer
break coming up there would be at least a further
six weeks without pay and no industrial pressure
facing the council.
3. We could only achieve the improvements we
did by agreeing to reluctantly recommend this
offer.
The above is our best assessment of the position.
Your negotiators took the responsibility of
campaigning for you to come out on strike and
feel we must also take the responsibility to
give you our assessment of when we think you
have achieved what can realistically be achieved.
Main improvements and clarifications in the
offer
1. The increase in the 'lump sum' of about
25%, bringing the top to £2,500 and the
lowest to approx £1,790 will be payable
on return to work and if the pay deadline is
missed, the council will seek to issue cheques.
It will be in this tax year.
2. The new rates will be paid from the day
of your return to work and the 35 hours will
be paid in good faith as arrangements are reached
on how the extra 2.5 are to be used. Before
you would have returned on your old rate until
the job description was fully agreed. Work has
started on the detail of the job description
and ACAS will assist if the timetable is slipping.
3. The senior posts' job descriptions have
to be agreed, as do the criteria, before the
start of next term. 110 posts means about one
in three nursery nurses will be able to progress
to point 25 and 26.
Questions and Answers
Q. Are UNISON negotiators satisfied with
this offer?
A. No we are not. Our belief was that Point
25 would have been an honourable settlement.
However we could not achieve that and we have
to recognise the reality of whether any further
action would achieve that.
Q. When would we return to work if we accept
the offer?
A. If the offer is accepted there is not purpose
in people losing any more money. A return to
work would be the week beginning Monday 31 May
2004.
Q. What happens if we reject the offer?
A. The industrial action would continue and
be reviewed by the Industrial Action Committee
as usual. We would attempt to get the council
back round the table, however our best assessment
is that the action is unlikely to deliver an
improvement in any realistic timescale.
Q. Can we go to Arbitration?
A. This is an option if you reject the offer
however it takes the whole thing out of our
hands. The council is also unlikely to agree.
Even if it did, arbitration would not just look
at the offers that are better than ours and
we have to recognise we are in the top quadrant
of settlements so far.
Q. Can we reject and just go back to work
on our old conditions, looking to fight again
via boycotts etc?
A. If we did, and there is no guarantee the
council would co-operate, we would have no muscle
at all to try to achieve any better than is
currently on offer though indefinite strike.
Q. Do we have to be called Early Years Workers?
A. There was some suggestion that council may
be open to discussion on this and we will certainly
try to change the title of the job.
Q. Will there be a return to work agreement?
A. The council agrees there will be no victimisation
of any striking staff and UNISON is in discussion
about the details of return to work if you vote
to accept.
Yours sincerely
John Stevenson
Branch Secretary
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