Tag Archives: PCS

PCS Annual Delegate Conference 2024

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Following the election of a Coalition for Change majority NEC, this years Annual Delegate Conference was going to be very important for members and activists who wanted to secure that victory by ensuring the policy of the union reflected the change in mood amongst the membership.

In that regard, it was a success.

Ensuring motions were heard

The Standing Orders Committee had ruled out several motions for technical or constitutional reasons. Despite many years of conference choosing to ignore please to over-turn standing orders decisions, an unprecedented number of delegates rose to challenge the, this year and great many of them were then overturned by conference, and the motions re-added to the running order.

Conference was not prepared to have motions submitted by members and branches over-ruled on minor bureaucratic points.

The National Campaign

The outgoing Left Unity NEC proposed a motion in a self-congratulatory fashion, hailed the success of last year’s action, and the £1500 non-consolidated payment as a victory. It didn’t acknowledge any shortcomings in last year’s dispute and made no mention of any re-ballots.

The motion, and the leadership, received heavy criticism from conference floor, largely relating to the decision to pause action last year in response to the £1500.

Two rival motions were moved in opposition to outgoing NEC’s. There were some differences between them, but both condemned the NEC for its conduct of the dispute and for the misleading wording of the consultative ballot which led to the pause.

In the end, Emergency motion A315 was passed, defeating the outgoing NEC’s motion. It calls on the leadership to coordinate with branches to ‘develop a plan for sustained, targeted action across those areas with a mandate’ and to ‘maintain the mood for action in these areas while re-balloting elsewhere commences’. It also called on the union to make 100,000 additional staff and a commitment to hybrid working part of the dispute.

A solid basis for the incoming Coalition for Change NEC to build upon.

Organising

The leadership also lost its organising motion, largely due to criticism of how they have conducted organising so far. The motion refused to accept any issues with the current organising strategy which has led us to the lowest proportion of members in the union in living memory and puts us in a position in many areas where we have very reduced leverage when we strike and where we could potentially be at threat of recognition.

The incoming majority leadership recognise this and have put forward a strategy for changing the unions organising strategy.

Political Strategy

There was also a debate on the political strategy. There were 2 motions in this debate A12 and A13 moved by the outgoing NEC.

A12 called on the NEC to put pressure on the Labour Party over specific and identified goals for and demands for them to commit to and enact in government to improve our organising and bargaining positions and to implement the elements of its programme relating to expanding workers’ rights and trade union freedoms. It called to demand that an incoming Labour government should immediately impose its policy commitments in these areas on the Cabinet Office and Civil Service leadership, to repeal Departmental bans on onsite strike meetings and other anti-union restrictions.

A13 in contrast did not commit the union to any political strategy in the election and take a completely uninterested view in the outcome or the policies of the parties or candidates vying for members votes.

Solidarity with the Palestinians

In the international section, motion A99 committed the union to continue its opposition to Israel’s attack on Gaza, for ‘a free and independent Palestinian state’, and against the victimisation of our members who have spoken out for Palestine.

The motion condemned Hamas’ killing of civilians on October 7th, but also condemned the mass killing, starvation and displacement of civilians by Israel in response. It welcomed PCS’ decision to donate substantial amounts of money to Medical Aid for Palestinians, and it also called on the union to provide guidance to members on their rights to attend protests and express views in support of the Palestinians.

This motion had widespread support. To the extent that there was debate, it was in nuances expressed by speakers supporting the motion. The SOC ordered the motion, stating other motions were covered by it. This included a motion claiming ‘antizionism isn’t antisemitism’, an absolute which is patently untrue and potentially discriminatory as there are examples of antizionism being antisemitism. Equally, motions expressing a desire for a 2-state settlement were tagged alongside those calling for the destruction of Israel. These positions are counter-posed and it would have been better to have an open debate on the question if some activists wished to change the unions position.

Again, we hope this predicates a much more active year for PCS’ international solidarity work, which, especially over Gaza was slow to materialise.

Equality and Trans Rights

Motion A52, noted the Tories’ anti-trans scapegoating, and the leaked Cabinet Office guidance which would have led to the harassment of trans and non-binary people. The motion instructed the NEC oppose any guidance which would marginalise trans and non-binary workers, and to organise action to confront this guidance if introduced. The motion passed overwhelmingly.

Conference once again rightfully asserting it’s belief in trans rights over a historically poor leadership position on the question.

A worker’s representative

In the Finance section, Assistant General Secretary and supporter of the Independent Left, John Moloney, gave a run down on the union’s finances, which are soon to be boosted by the re-introduction of the strike levy. He also mentioned his pledge to take only an inner London EO’s wage on the basis that union officials should not gain financially by given the privilege of being elected. As a result, he has given the rest of the ridiculously high AGS salary back to the union. This has meant he has now paid back well over £100,000 to the strike fund.

PCS NEC election results: A win for the Coalition for Change

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The PCS NEC election results have now been published.

The Coalition for Change, which brought together the PCS Independent Left (IL), Broad Left Network (BLN) and other groups and independents, has secured a clear NEC majority on a principled programme that addresses the key issues facing members and our trade union.

We thank the many branches that nominated Change candidates, the activists and members who voted and campaigned for them, and all the members who took part in PCS’ democracy.

Members have clearly voted for change in these NEC elections, confirming the mood for radical change within PCS that was evidenced during last year’s senior officer elections.

There is a great deal of work to be done by the incoming NEC, not least because:

  • Civil Service pay is in unprecedented long term decline.
  • Tens of thousands of members are stuck on and near the legal minimum wage.
  • The civil service is strong arming members into office working pattens that are unnecessary and discriminatory.
  • Non-civil service members all too often have poor terms and conditions, woeful employer regimes, and are under organised and under supported by national union. 
  • Membership levels are too low, damaging our leverage.

The Coalition NEC members cannot overnight put right all that has been put right wrong, but they can and will start that work.

Our most immediate challenge is to respond to the results of the civil service wide ballots on pay and other issues, which will conclude on 13 May.  It is unfortunate that we will have to undertake that task when the decisions of Left Unity NEC members and senior PCS officials have left our union in a weaker position today than we were in a year ago, but it is vital that PCS begins to rebuild the purchasing power of our wages.

Independent Left NEC members will:

  • Seek sharp debates on policy issues and collaborative working on delivering for members.
  • Place equality genuinely at the heart of everything PCS does.
  • Seek to end the spin culture that has too long dominated PCS and insist on timely, comprehensive, national negotiating reports to members.
  • Never forget that the lives of PCS members are affected by events outside of our workplaces and that social and international solidarity must be a PCS lode star.

IL supporters have long played a critical role in PCS. We pioneered equality impact assessments of employer policies; established that the Crown is the legal employer of all civil servants; pioneered cross departmental equal pay claims; led fightbacks against office closures; argued alone for many years that a Fighting Fund War Chest and paid selective action must be vital parts of PCS’ armoury; sought the contractualisation of terms and conditions so that they cannot be arbitrarily changed by our employer, and have long fought for a membership led union. Please join us.

IL Statement On DWP Elections

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At present, the joint Independent Left/Broad Left Network candidate standing for DWP President, Bev Laidlaw, will be omitted from the DWP Group Executive Committee ballot paper on the stated grounds that she did not accept the nomination within the deadline. 

Bev does not agree with this view and decision. Without going into all the detail here, Bev indicated her acceptance within the deadline, stating  “please find attached my election addresses for DWP Elections 2024; DWP Group President and Ordinary GEC member.” On any reasonable reading a candidate stating that are attaching election addresses and identification the posts they cover is a statement that they do accept nomination for those posts. 

Supported by IL and BLN colleagues (who are also standing as part of the Coalition for  Change in the NEC elections), Bev has challenged this decision, although the “procedure” allowed for challenge is not one we would recommend and the HQ decision, as it stands at present, will mean that the LU candidate will be elected unopposed.

The wider view we take, and that Bev has expressed, is that trade unions should favour the maximisation of democracy, reduce obstacles to candidates standing, and promote contested elections rather than omit candidates for reasons unconnected to the key issues of whether a candidate is in membership, is a member in the relevant constituency, has been properly nominated, and has accepted nomination. Going forward after the election, we will therefore be looking to ensure PCS’ election arrangements reflect these fundamental democratic principles.

In the here and now, it is crucial that everyone of us, who wants change in our union, who is serious about winning on pay and wants democratic, accountable leaders, redouble our efforts to vote for and campaign for BLN/IL/Change candidates in Group and National Executive Committee elections.

You can read our programme here, and see the candidates we endorse here.

Vote for change.

PCS National Campaign Strategy: Sabotage or Incompetence?

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The PCS NEC met last week to discuss last minute proposals from the General Secretary for this year’s national campaign strategy.

Observant members will notice that last year’s national campaign, which we were told was merely ‘paused’ has, as we predicted, been swept under the carpet, never to be spoken of again. But as a reminder – we settled on the lowest pay offer in the public sector and a £1500 bonus which the failed candidate for Assistant General Secretary told bargaining units to accept being paid pro-rata’d.

The NEC decided on a pay-claim and a national consultative ballot for strike action, which they have described as a ‘survey’, which would be carried out over 2-weeks from the 20th of February, which may or may not result in a disaggregated Civil Service statutory ballot before May.

Ballot timetable

To put this in context, branches were asked to agitate around a consultative ballot on pay, which would commence less than a week after it was announced, would last only 10 working-days and who’s demands have been sprung on members and activists at the last minute without any consultation or rationale.

The formula of a short, rushed consultative ballot with little preparation time and minimal rank-and-file engagement, followed by the potential of a statutory ballot if the response is positive is paint-by-numbers Left Unity industrial strategy. But this timetable is particularly galling.

Such a rushed ballot strategy presents 3 key issues:

Firstly, the incompetent administration of the ballot is already causing problems. From members not being sent the links on the day the ballot started, to being asked for their National Insurance Number rather than membership number to vote and hosting the ballot site on a none ‘https’ secure server. All are unnecessary barriers to participation and will reduce turnout.

Secondly, a predictably poor turnout does not provide an accurate measure of members feelings. It also provides those who would rather not move to a statutory ballot the ammunition to argue that members are not sufficiently prepared for action. The leadership have used this argument previously not to move to a statutory ballot and we should be conscious this may be the case again.

Thirdly, running potentially 2 ballots in such a short space of time is a recipe for unnecessary confusion and fatigue among members and activists. Members are potentially being asked to take part in two ballots, asking the same question within weeks of each other, and activists are being asked to turnout the vote twice over. As both ballots are conducted in different ways, more confusion is likely.

The Academic Study

The foundation of the pay claim was an academic study commissioned by the union on pay trends in the civil service overtime, but specifically since 2007. For transparency, we attach the study at the bottom of this article.

This was received by the union in January, but not shared with the NEC until just before the meeting and not shared with branches until this week.

The study illustrates the serious loss in real-terms wages since 2007, summarising that just to restore real-term earnings to 2010 levels, an average of 35% pay increases at grades AA-EO would be required.

This figure does not surprise us. Independent Left comrades both in branches and on the NEC have consistently argued that pay restoration is a key demand and that to continually carry over the same pay claim year-on-year while pay shrinks, is a tacit endorsement of real term pay losses. Historically, this has been met with ridicule, with the leadership stating that members would find a 35% pay demand to be absurd.

Pay Restoration

They say good things come in groups of 3. During the last years national campaign, the union adopted 2 tactics we had been advancing for years. Namely selective/targeted action in areas which were industrially disruptive and a levy on members subs to ensure such action could be supported.

This year, the NEC has rightfully adopted the demand of pay restoration, although one could argue too little too late considering years of real-terms pay degradation.

Pay restoration is a key demand. It’s not an arbitrary percentage rise which has no basis in the material reality of members experiences, and which isn’t tied to the increase in the cost of living. It’s asserting the principle that workers’ salaries should at a bare minimum always keep up with the cost of living. It is good it’s finally been adopted.

Lowest paid left out

Why then, hasn’t the £15/r under-pin for our worst paid members been uprated? £15/hr was in the 2022 claim and since then, we’ve had historically high inflation. It would be excellent if we simply won on pay restoration, but if we don’t achieve that, the point of the underpin was to act as a separate bargaining point for our lowest paid.

They have been sadly ignored by this claim.

Hybrid working

Many thousands of our members have since the end of the pandemic, little choice by to attend the office daily, despite proving during the pandemic they were able to do much of their work from home.

One of the key issues for hybrid workers is the move to increase office attendance from 40% to 60%. This is a widely and deeply held grievance, which if included in the claim would help to increase participation.

For non-hybrid workers a specific demand advancing the principle for flexible working where possible should be included.

Exclusion of FM workers

Once again outsourced and facilities management workers are left out of the claim. We understand this pay claim is for Civil Service Workers, but there is no reason why the demands we’ve made nationally for our outsourced workers should not sit-beside them in a joint campaign.

As it is we have a national campaign, into which most of the union’s effort is focussed with a much more secondary and in many groups like the DWP, non-existent campaign for Facilities Management workers. Workers which hold significant industrial power in our workplaces and who through a coordinated campaign could bolster leverage for all members.

So, incompetence or sabotage? Or a mixture of both?

The question for us is, is this strategy designed to sabotage the campaign from the start or is it simply a poor, incompetent plan? We will give the new leadership the benefit of the doubt and go with the latter, but there may well be members of the leadership faction who do have the inclination or capability to fight an industrial campaign.

What is telling, is that numerous NEC members have admitted in various forums that they hadn’t even read the study before voting on the claim, preferring to simply accept the claim as presented by the general secretary. Whatever your faction, the role of an NEC member is to scrutinise decisions based on the total amount of evidence. It is depressing, but not surprising that NEC members do not think this is important.

Regardless, we have a lot of work to do over the next weeks to ensure the maximum membership turnout. Vote Yes to industrial action.

What’s the alternative?

If the aim is to have a live mandate by conference in order to be able to take action in a timely fashion during this year’s pay round, we should have begun the process much earlier, on the safe assumption that the pay-remit would not be acceptable to us.

As we are where we are, we believe a better option would be to use the coming weeks to continue to ensure the foundations in branches are prepared for a statutory ballot, not to agitate around a superfluous consultative ballot.

In terms of the claim, pay restoration is good (but needs to be explained to members), but the refusal to uprate the underpin and the omittance of one of the key workplace issues of the day – flexible working – are serious oversights which could have been caught if the process wasn’t so rushed or we had a different leadership.

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PCS leadership abolish Scottish Government Group without consulting them

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In one of his last acts in office, outgoing General Secretary Mark Serwotka issued Branch Bulletin BB-006-24.

In the BB he states, “On 7 February 2023, the government (that is the UK government) published a policy paper announcing a number of machinery of government changes” and as a result of this ‘There are also knock-on effects to arrangements currently existing in PCS groups and sectors, in particular the Public Sector Group and the Scottish and Welsh sectors…’ He goes on to claim, “The need for decisions is pressing given that the employer has established its new structures, thereby rendering ours unfit for purpose.”

This decision has created uproar with the GEC and activists of the Scottish Government Group, who say they have not been consulted,  and that the announcement that their Group will be no more has come as a complete shock to them. Plainly at least many activists in Scottish Group do not agree with the abolition of their Group and an unnecessary but wholly leadership driven internal PCS dispute has erupted.

Certainly the reasoning set out by Mr Serwotka make no sense in relation to the Scottish Government Group. After all, what have changes in the UK Civil Service, which he lists in the BB, have to do with the Scottish government? Those changes might mean that the ”need for decisions is pressing given that the employer has established its new structures, thereby rendering ours unfit for purpose” for the affected UK departments, but not for the Scottish Government Group.

The IL can see an argument for setting up a Scottish Sector Group to push forward the fight for national pay, terms and conditions of all those organisations that are directly funded by the Scottish Government but that is not what Mr Serwotka is saying. He claims changes in the UK Civil Service mean the Scottish Government Group must be abolished. Logic and detail were never Mr Serwotka’s strong point as this, his parting shot shows.

The Independent Left stands solidly behind those calling for the whole exercise to be stopped, so that the review of structures can take place without pressure. Trade Union leaders who have not morphed into 100% bureaucrats would understand that major union decisions will be most successfully implemented, and will best serve members, if the representatives and members affected believe they are not confronted with a fait accompli, are genuinely consulted, and at least in their majority persuaded of the merits of the decisions. There is a democratic argument that any such changes be put to ADC and in any case a membership vote.

Whilst the NEC might have the arbitrary power to scrap and create groups without consultation, they should not, not only in this instance but in all other instances. They should draw back from their decision and commence a thorough consultation with all affected representatives and members starting with the relevant highest committees: national officials and the NEC should not seek to bypass Group Executive Committees.

If the Left Unity cabal that actually run PCS are true to form they will try and cast this dispute into one of malign forces operating behind the scene creating an artificial upset. Nothing could be further from the truth. The outrage is genuine and is a response to what people see as a fait accompli,  an undemocratic act.

If the NEC ploughs on with the forcible shutting down of the Scottish Government Group then we will support any suitable motion brought to ADC 2024. Let’s have a democratic debate there.

Last but certainly not least, this instance, and others, throw up whether the current constitution is fit for purpose and whether it should be wholesale brought up to date (it is decades old) and in line with that of a membership led union. The IL has argued that representatives of members working for the Scottish Government should have more power within PCS and the current dispute reinforces that view.

A New Deal for members in DWP: Vote for a new leadership

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The union in DWP is dying. The proportion of members in the union is the lowest in living memory and continues to fall. To reverse this, we need to become relevant to the needs of members and begin to fight and win on issues specific to our members in DWP. We also need an independent industrial strategy which includes targeted paid strike action and action short of strike where necessary to win. If you agree with us, please nominate and vote for these candidates in the upcoming DWP Group Executive elections.

For a proper campaign on Staffing

DWP are recruiting into UC, but it’s too little too late. The union needs to urgently address the worsening staff to manager ratio. At present this is anything up to 1:15 – at this rate managers are unable to provide the support staff require. We will demand this is reduced urgently to 1:10.

We are acutely aware of overcrowding in many Jobcentres, leading to a stressful and unsafe working environment. There is no room on the ever-shrinking estate for the staff they want to recruit, let alone the amount we need. We will negotiate for proper, flexible and hybrid working for staff and demand the re-opening of appropriate REEP sites to better serve our staff and our communities.

The principle of Flexible working

Staff should have the ultimate flexibility to choose to work from home or the office, including operational staff where this can be enabled by technology. When we stepped-up and delivered during the pandemic, we proved that this was possible.

For most job roles, a policy of mandating any arbitrary percentage in the office is unnecessary, unworkable and inequal.

The current leadership did little to oppose the implementation of the arbitrary 40% office working dictat. We will organise an evidence-led campaign, including industrial pressure to oppose any attempt to increase 40% office attendance and to make the case for flexible working, based on workers choice for all staff where it can be enabled by technology.

A 4-day week

The principle of a 4-day week with no loss-in pay is a fast-growing demand with an increasing number of successful trials taking place across the world. Despite it being an overwhelmingly popular policy, the union has not attempted to negotiate with the DWP on this issue.

We will make demands on the employer for a trail of a 4-day week with no loss in pay, employing evidence from similar trials and the ever-growing number of academic papers conducted on the subject.

The use of Artificial Intelligence

The threat of Artificial Intelligence to our jobs is very real, but it doesn’t have to be. We will demand AI is only implemented in a way which serves citizens and staff, that reduces work, not jobs, and acts as an enabler for a reduction in the working week with no detriment to members.

We will start by immediately seeking an agreement with DWP that AI systems only be implemented with consultation with the union and that they should meet strict criteria on their use.

Organising outsourced workers

It’s essential that we organise our outsourced security, cleaning, and facilities management workers. These workers are some of the lowest paid in our workplaces with the worst terms and conditions, yet have some of the most industrial strength. Without them, our offices could not function.

Unfortunately, the union in DWP do not share this view. In London, reps have recruited more than half of all PCS organised G4S guards on the DWP contract in the UK. Last year members formed demands on pay, holiday & sickness allowances and union recognition and voted to strike.

The DWP Group leadership blocked them from carrying out a statutory ballot. The reasons given were that they hadn’t recruited outside of London and that it would anger the GMB.

We will support these members to strike and use their willingness to fight to recruit outsourced workers across the UK to join the action. Action they can’t take in the GMB as they signed a no-strike agreement!

Pay and the Employee Deal

It’s been 8 years since the start of the Employee Deal and we are still feeling the hurt. This leadership permanently sold our weekends and evenings to the employer for a pay deal which has now been totally wiped-out by the rise in the cost of living.

Anyone who works in Jobcentre or Service Centre understands that is no legitimate business need to keep staff away from their friends and family on a Saturday. The 2-tier workforce created between those who must and those who don’t is an affront to basic trade union principles.

Having supported the Employee Deal, the current leadership feel unable to revisit this with the employer. Having been against it from the start, we have no such qualms. As part of a wide DWP campaign on flexible working and a reduction in hours we will renegotiate ED and include demands to reduce and phase out Saturday working, to be supported by industrial action including action short of a strike where appropriate.