The unions leadership is at pains to tell us that “Nobody will be left behind” from the current settlement, but not everyone is getting the £1500 payment.

This article focusses on the sex discrimination inherent in the pro-ratering of the £1500 payment. We will write shortly about the other members being left behind, including those in the culture sector, where employers are simply refusing to pay the money and the Left Unity leadership are asking our members in those institutions to fight on alone.

The current position

The largest government department, DWP have just announced that they will prorate the £1500 for part-time workers. We assume that most other departments, if they haven’t already, will follow suit.

Given that the great bulk of part-timers are women, this means in reality that we are seeing prorating by gender. There’s other gender equality issues that haven’t been addressed either, for example, it’s not clear that women on unpaid maternity leave during the qualifying period will be paid.

How did this come to pass?

Well, we can blame the Left Unity leadership and the General Secretary.

If this sounds harsh, let’s examine the facts as we know them. Unlike the NHS, teachers, rail, etc. there have been no pay talks, as far as we are aware, between the union and the UK Civil Service in regard to 4.5% plus 0.5%; Ministers just announced it.

Similarly, with the £1500 there was no direct negotiations either, where our team meets theirs. What seems to have happened is there were back channel discussions between the General Secretary and the Civil Service, and out of these the £1500 emerged.

One of the reasons the union fields teams for pay and other talks, is that a group of people bring different ideas and experiences to such talks.

If the £1500 had been proposed to a team, then someone might have said; the cost of living impacts part time and full time staff the same (you don’t get a discount on energy bills for being a part timer) and the £1500 supposedly is “in recognition of the pressures” faced by all staff, so therefore we must insist on it being paid in full for all staff.

Instead, as only Mark Serwotka was involved in the talks, then the above mustn’t have occurred to him (we are taking the most charitable view here – the alternative is that he did know but didn’t push for it), just as it didn’t occur to him that as the £1500 is not new money so staff related budgets might have to be squeezed to get the dough – staff will end up paying for it, one way or the other.

Publicly against pro-rateing; privately accepting it

On the 6th of June, a Management Action Brief (MAB) was issued by the union for bargainers, stating that once employers had committed to pay the £1500, ‘pro-ratered where applicable’, bargaining units should go into negotiations on the consolidated pay remit.

Firstly, where is pro-ratering applicable? The public statements from the union and the General Secretary, including at members meetings, is that it shouldn’t be in any circumstances.

Secondly, either the dispute is still continuing and no delegated bargaining is allowed, as per the NEC’s own Motion A292 at national conference, or the leadership has already begun to end the dispute unilaterally, prior to members voting.

No equality impact assessment

In the creation of any policy or pay settlement, employers are bound to ensure that they don’t disproportionately impact any protected characteristic. The leadership should have asked for equality evidence. They have not asked for it and they have not issued any advice to bargaining units regarding equality impacts. An abrogation to the unions commitment to equality.

The dispute must continue

DWP’s announcement, along with other employers, is a further reason why the dispute must go on, particularly when you consider that the payment of the monies announced are not conditional on us ending the dispute. So if you are going to get the money in any case, why not stick out for more!