The agenda for this meeting was incredibly packed due to the NEC repeatedly not getting through business and having items rolled into the next meeting. Despite this, the NEC only ran for a half day from 1:30-5:30pm. This resulted in us only getting through two substantive agenda items – the National Campaign report and the National Disputes report. The rest of the meeting was taken up by Rule 10 complaints.

The meeting opened as every NEC meeting opens; with the Record of Decisions from the last meeting being voted on. Coalition for Change comrades attempted to move amendments to the RoDs regarding motions from branches about the Special Delegate Conference. Unfortunately, these amendments were ruled out of order by the President. This presidential ruling was challenged by CfC comrades but to overrule it would require a 2/3^rds majority which wasn’t met.

National Campaign

Next, we moved onto the national campaign paper and in a truly shocking turn of events, the President announced that a motion submitted by the Coalition for Change was going to be allowed to be heard as part of this agenda item! Before the motion could be debated though, we listened to the General secretary’s leadoff on her paper. This took quite a while considering there were no recommendations in the paper, which was mostly just an update on the various unfruitful meetings that have happened since early December. What does seem to come through loud and clear from it, is the complete and utter lack of genuine engagement we are getting from the Cabinet Office. The paper expressly states they ‘have no plans to move towards sectoral collective bargaining for the civil service’ and ‘did not believe any agreement was possible’. On the question of facilities time, the Cabinet Office is apparently ‘open to reviewing its guidance’ but we wouldn’t hold our breath for a positive outcome from this review given previous experience. All in all, the change in government has certainly not resulted in any kind of step change when it comes to their own workforce. In fact, on pay the government have outlined recommendations for a 2.8% rise this year, very close to the current and projected rate of inflation this year and much lower than the unions demand to make-up for the dramatic real-terms pay cuts we’ve experienced since 2010. All that talk from Labour of ‘a new deal for working people’ just seems like a distant memory now.

After the GS led off on her paper, she indicated that she was in support of the motion submitted by CfC comrades. This motion seeks to put us on a war footing and lays out a set of actions which aim to get us ready to win a resounding yes vote in any future ballot. While we find it hard to trust any Left Unity support – and Independent Left comrades openly suspect political manoeuvring was at play – the unanimous vote in favour of this motion is still a positive step forward for the national campaign.

Not least of all because amongst other things the motion calls for;

• NECLOs to urgently seek the convening of EC meetings for their areas, to report on discussions with the Cabinet Office and to make clear the NEC view that significant progress is unlikely without a serious fight.
• All NECLOs to seek input from their areas on what the demands should be, the current mood of members, and what steps lead reps believe should be taken, either at national or delegated level, to build the mood for a serious dispute.
• Particular attention to be paid to any views on what resources the lead reps across the union believe they need to deliver an overwhelming “Yes” vote in a ballot, and likewise views on how to build for and support the inclusion of devolved and commercial sector areas (as per A315 passed at ADC).
• A comms strategy and calendar to be devised and agreed by the Senior Officers Committee reflecting the union’s demands, which will include supporting Groups to speak to their members via well-advertised online meetings.
• Organising materials to be prepared and circulated to branches ASAP.
• The General Secretary to work across the TUC, Public Sector Liaison Group and other affiliated forums to build the appetite for action across the movement.
• An extraordinary NEC to be convened in February to discuss feedback and the latest position in negotiations, and to gauge the mood among members and judge the requirement for a statutory/indicative ballot and how and when it should be conducted.

During the debate members of LU seemed to insinuate that the reason they were supporting the CfC motion is because it lays out much of what the GS had already tried to implement previously and we could have been doing months ago. This is likely a foreshadowing of attack lines which will be used in the upcoming NEC elections so in order to dispel any myths that might start circulating, it’s worth reminding ourselves of the previous recommendations put forward by the GS in key NEC papers

• May 2024: The NEC to take stock of new conference policy, our political leverage and the outcome of the General Election before determining a way forward for the National Campaign
• July 2024: More consideration, further forums and meetings with the new government
• August 2024: Welcome the concessions won so far, pause any plans for industrial action at this stage, pause the levy, engage in further talks at delegated level to try to secure more money than the 4.5% pay offer on the table.

Absolutely none of this outlines any kind of serious industrial strategy.  

What was also worth noting during this debate is after the failure of the previous, LU, NEC’s ballot in May 2024, data was collected which could be used to analyse strengths and weakness at branch level, to assist in building for the next campaign. The General Secretary informed the NEC in July that ‘those conversations will now begin’. But they don’t seem to have done? We ask reps and members, have FTOs spoken to you about your results and what you could do next time? Whether this inaction is a result of Heathcote’s PCS being more occupied by shifting staff around for political purposes, or something deeper, is unclear.

The Coalition for Change motion agreed by the NEC on Wednesday makes clear that engagement with reps about what could have been better last year, and what they need to win this time, is essential. But in a further sign that the General Secretary is more concerned in consolidating her own power than running an effective union, instructions from the NEC which would have led to the creation of data and material that could have been used for organising and agitational purposes have gone ignored.

At the September NEC, the Coalition passed three motions written by the IL. One instructed the General Secretary to systematically capture having comprehensive pay and HR data from across the civil service. Much of this is publicly available, further could be obtained by bargaining information requests, FOI, parliamentary questions, or other means. This data would make clear the degree of unequal and discriminatory pay in the Civil Service. The General Secretary was further instructed to plan for how this data would be made accessible for reps and FTOs. It would aid pay negotiators in local bargaining, and the union to evidence indirect discrimination, with the ability to run campaigns on both.

Two further motions sought to better organise Government Digital and Data (formerly DDaT) workers, a diverse and growing component of the Civil Service (currently ~5% of all staff). The General Secretary was instructed to try and revive the union’s moribund Professional and Managers’ Association (PMA) by inviting Digital and Data workers to use it as a viable forum where they can discuss common professional and occupational concerns. If successful, this could become a self-organising group within the union, always a good thing!

Digital and Data professionals have a separate pay settlement from their colleagues across the departments they work in. But, not being a natural constituency of LU’s workerism, they have been paid little attention to. So, in another motion, the General Secretary was instructed to take the necessary soundings with relevant activists and members, and then draft a Digital and Data pay claim and a claim regarding changes to the framework under which their roles operate.

Such work takes time, we appreciate. But it also takes work. Unfortunately, when an IL NEC member asked the General Secretary for a progress update on Wednesday, they were informed nothing had been done. This was because, according to the GS such matters were the job of the Assistant General Secretary. AGS John Moloney intervened to say that the work had never been remitted to him, nor had he been asked to do it. The NEC had asked the General Secretary to do it. John was perhaps too polite to mention that Heathcote had abolished his office and staff, in an attempt to isolate and disempower him in favour of consolidating resources around herself and the unelected (and election losing) Paul O’Connor.

National disputes

The GS next delivered her paper on National Disputes. In short, there are lots of disputes happening across PCS. Many of them are disputes being led by outsourced FM workers who represent some of our worst paid members. These members are more often than not doing extremely difficult jobs in terrible conditions. Over the past year new focus has been given, under the Assistant General Secretary, to these really important disputes which are recruiting many new members.

Branches and Committees are encouraged to send messages of solidarity as well as advertise these disputes and where possible organise members to attend picket lines. A full list of all current disputes can be found in the paper linked above.

Rule 10s

Finally the last couple of hours of the meeting were spent on rule 10 complaints.

Rule 10.1 of the PCS rulebook states:

“Where, on receipt of a complaint from a PCS Branch or any individual member, the NEC considers there are grounds for considering whether a member has seriously prejudiced the Union’s interests, and is not a fit or proper person to remain a member and/or hold Union office, it may start action under this Rule.”

These complaints are of course highly confidential and no NEC member would ever write about individual cases in a report like this. However, it is probably worth understanding exactly what rule 10 states in order to understand the very serious nature of them. In the most serious cases Rule 10s can result in someone being stripped of their membership of the union so we’re sure readers will understand why it’s vital for due consideration, debate and oversight to be given to these matters.