February 2002

National Joint Forum Trade Union Side Pay Claim for 2002

As reported in the January edition of ACM News, discussions have been continuing between the National Joint Forum (NJF) unions in order to prepare a joint core pay claim for submission to the Association of Colleges (AoC). The claim will take into account AoC, recognition during the pay negotiations last year, to work towards achieving equality of pay, by September 2004, for staff in further education when compared with those employed in schools.

The key components of the draft claim are:

• For all staff, a substantial pay increase, with a flat rate element, which provides significant progress on achieving parity with relative comparable groups and addresses low pay in the sector.

• A minimum starting salary of £11,000 for all support staff.

• The removal of points 3/4 from the lecturers scale and progression for lecturers to point 16.

• Negotiations to agree national pay scales for implementation in all colleges, with career and pay progression equivalent to comparable groups, including school teachers and local government staff.

• A weighting allowance of £4,000 across all London and its fringes.

• An AoC commitment to negotiate a National Guidelines Agreement on annual leave and working hours (including teaching workloads), with a maximum 35 hour working week.

• For staff transferring between colleges, recognition of previous work in colleges as continuous service for all contractual entitlements including holiday, maternity and sickness leave.

• A joint AoC/union campaign to reduce casual employment in the sector.

• An NJF bid to government for resources to collect comprehensive staffing statistics.

It is hoped that all of the unions will have approved the joint claim for submission to AoC on 25th February. An initial response is expected from the employers side at the NJF meeting scheduled for 16th April.

This year’s negotiations are expected to be particularly difficult. Many colleges will argue that they are unable to pay any increase to staff that is above the level of general increase in funding received for the sector (2.5%). From the union perspective, any settlement that gives further education employees less than school and higher education teachers would be totally unacceptable. NATFHE have already indicated their intention to ballot members for industrial action if AoC does not make a satisfactory offer at the NJF meeting on 16th April. Much will depend on the outcome of the Comprehensive Spending Review settlement, which will be announced later in the year.

ACM members and branches are invited to submit their views on the pay claim to Peter Pendle by email at peterpendle@acm.uk.com.