The NEC on 7/11/24 started with the President ruling the NEC Majority’s motion on the national campaign out of order. The decision was challenged, but a two-thirds majority was not reached. Results were 14 for, 16 against.

The General Secretary committed to getting a full picture of the position of groups’ delegated pay talks for the December NEC. IL hope this will enable a full and open discussion on the National Campaign. She believes the vast majority are utilising the 5% remit from the Treasury.

Motion 7 referenced reducing the levy but as above mentioned this was ruled out of order.

 The General Secretary’s paper on the national campaign made no proposal on the levy, due to Standing Orders prohibiting revisiting decisions within three months.

There was no specific motion on the levy but the President took a vote on whether the NEC was willing to revisit the previous NEC decision to not pause the levy. IL and the other NEC Majority members voted against this because we want an open and informed discussion and decision on the levy with the option to review and reduce, the result was 15/15 (two thirds majority required). We hope to be able to discuss this in more detail at the December NEC.

IL believes that levy should be significantly reduced, but again, there was no option for IL members to vote for this. In addition, IL believes that PCS needs to ensure that money is raised for disputes outside of the national campaign, especially those in facilities management, including members in G4S.

The General Secretary reported that PCS is pushing for improvements to Employment Right Bill. PCS is also making the case that the civil service should not wait for the bill to look making improvements to terms and conditions, such as removing restrictions on facility time.

PCS NEC Majority comrades moved a motion to add “flesh on the bones” to PCS’s position on the Employment Rights Bill, confirming areas where the bill is lacking and giving actions to campaign for improvements. This motion was carried unanimously.

Agreement was also reached on papers regarding Organising, the PCS Parliamentary Group, TUC Women’s Conference motions and TUC Youth Conference motions among other items.

The General Secretary introduced a paper ‘for noting’ regarding the role of NEC Liaison Officers (NECLO) to Group, Forums and Regions, apparently aimed at clarifying the role. The General Secretary believes that NECLOs should report NEC meetings and positions neutrally, taking collective responsibility for the decisions of the NEC, without concentrating on the positions of different groups participating in those discussions. This directive to NECLOs came despite the General Secretary’s own recent communication to all members, using PCS-held members’ emails official social media accounts, that gave a biased and inaccurate report on NEC business.

This demonstrates the General Secretary’s double standard on taking collective responsibility for NEC decisions. The NEC Majority refused to note the paper. However, due to numbers present at the time, the vote was 16-16, and the President had the casting vote to note the paper.

In a break from normal procedures, in which the lay-led Finance Committee’s report is put to the NEC by the Assistant General Secretary, the General Secretary decided to move an alternative Finance report containing the recommendations of unelected full-time officials in the Finance Department.

These recommendations, which had been rejected by the Finance Committee, were shared with NEC members in a 17-page paper one hour before the NEC meeting commenced. This is unacceptable and undermines elected NEC members’ ability to properly scrutinise the union’s finances.

Having been prevented from voting on the Finance Committee’s own recommendations, the NEC discussed the General Secretary’s Finance Report, which among other recommendations proposed an increase to members’ subscriptions of 5%.

IL believes that the elected Finance Committee should be given the opportunity to scrutinise any proposed increase to members’ subscriptions, to ensure that such a move would be necessary and proportionate, and that members’ subs are being used in the best way. We also maintain that the Finance Report should be proposed by the elected National Treasurer, a role held by Assistant General Secretary John Moloney.

During the NEC debate, the Democracy Alliance (the NEC minority, who count the General Secretary and President among their members) sought to argue that rejecting the 5% subscription hike would prevent PCS from raising wages for its full time officers by the same proportion, which would only be true if members’ subscriptions were entirely spent on staff costs. In reality PCS’ financial picture is more complex than that, collective bargaining with GMB (the union for PCS staff) should determine the agreement on full-time officer pay, and Conference has in any case decided to reiterate PCS’ commitment to limiting staffing costs to 33% of subscription income. After a lengthy discussion, it was decided to make no decision, and the Finance Committee will be reconvened.

There were various items on the NEC agenda which did not get heard due to the lengthy debates on Finance, NECLO responsibilities and the National Campaign. These items include the majority of motions submitted by NEC members, Artificial Intelligence, Facilities Management, ARMs, H&S and Climate Change.

*7/11/24 was one day meeting, December NEC scheduled to be two day meeting.