21 June 2002
In an embarrassing U-turn for the union's leaders, delegates at its annual local government conference on June 16–17 overwhelmingly rejected government plans for a statutory code of practice for outsourced staff.
Despite officials accepting the findings of the Best Value Review group, published by former local government secretary Stephen Byers on May 14, delegates claimed that a code would fail to protect employment conditions and pension rights. Instead, in the first of many anti-Labour motions, they voted to step up the campaign against the use of the private sector and the two-tier workforce.
Officially, Unison leaders said they would be pressing for the government to re-open negotiations on the issue. But privately, a source told Public Finance: 'This is a major problem for us.'
The news is unlikely to please the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, which is drawing up the statutory code. It is understood to be ready to publish the code in the next few weeks and such a rejection even before its launch is likely to hold up implementation.
A return to negotiations, however, would prove a greater headache. The original talks spanning six months were said to border on the farcical, with neither local authorities, unions nor the private sector able to make any progress on the issue.
The CBI, which also sat on the review group, described Unison's move as premature. 'We should monitor whether a code works before ripping it up,' said Amanda McIntyre, head of the modernising government group. 'Our priority must be to put a framework in place and then raise awareness of how to put it into practice. We should not still be talking about details.'
She added that Unison's rejection of the plan was not necessarily a step back. 'Let's just see it as a pause.'
PFjun2002
