Members will have likely seen an email today from the General Secretary and President informing members that the NEC majority decided to vote against balloting the membership over the 5% offer, taking strike action and abolishing the Levy. This account of what happened is completely and utterly dishonest.

As any pretence of civility from the LU minority on the NEC is now clearly over and done with. We will start by saying this – It has become increasingly clear over the past few months that LU are more than happy to completely trash our pay dispute and throw PCS members under the bus in order to secure electoral gains for their faction and ensure they are the only voice in the room. They are a bureaucracy out of control.

The truth of the matter is, we didn’t vote against taking action. The NEC majority was faced with a paper from the General Secretary which was a complete and utter capitulation to the employer and would have our members ‘welcome’ an increasingly less tantalising pay rise alongside a promise of job cuts.

To mitigate this, the NEC majority attempted to move an alternative strategy (both in writing and verbally) that would:

• Reject the 5%, and demand the re-opening of negotiations over the remit which included the following demands alongside pay:
  • Moved us towards National Pay Bargaining.
  • Removed the threat of “efficiencies” or job losses enshrined in the remit guidance.
  • Ensured the remit was fully-funded and that departments wouldn’t need to use their own money to service the next increase in the minimum wage to raise the salaries of the – already disgracefully paid – AA and AO grades.
  • Agreed the reintroduction of pay-progression through salary bands which was removed as an option under the coalition and subsequent Tory administrations.
  • Laid down an agreement on the implementation of AI where the benefits of its implmentation was shared with staff through, for example, a reduction in the working week.
  • Included a timetable for the resolution of our long-standing pensions over-payment claim.
• Temporarily pause delegated talks while pursuing further national talks
• Reduce the levy and immediately review it in consultation with members
• Ensure we are bargaining nationally on all the national pay frameworks including Digital, Data and Technology (DDAT) which – bizarrely – former NEC’s have refused to engage with.
• Build towards balloting members

In negotiations with the Cabinet Office, your General Secretary and President failed to raise a single one of these demands. They are asking you to accept a position without even putting your demands to the employer.

The motion raising these positions was ruled out of order (ineligible for debate and/or vote) by the National President because it disagreed with the General Secretary’s paper. This has happened to the vast, vast, vast majority of motions submit by NEC majority members since June; because according to the president’s interpretation of the rules, apparently, disagreeing with the General Secretary is against the NEC standing orders.

There are no two ways around this. The President and General Secretary are refusing to abide by the decisions of the highest body of the union.

We are of course incredibly angry about where we find ourselves when it comes to the pay dispute but we are apoplectic about the way parts of our leadership will nakedly use bureaucratic manoeuvring to undermine the will of the members they are supposed to serve. In that spirit we ask all members to carefully consider what they want their union to look like? Who exactly is supposed to be in charge of a democratic union? And what behaviour you are willing accept from your elected representatives? Because right now our union feels a lot like merely the plaything of the General Secretary.