Workplace Report July 2009

Health and safety - round-up of the year's changes, including climate law; London Weighting - Has London weighting suffered in the downturn?; Transfer, dismissal and redundancy case law

Pay and prices

CPI inflation below 2% (277 words)

Inflation as measured by the Retail Prices Index (RPI) remained in negative territory for the fourth month in a row. For the year to ...

Labour Research Department three-monthly pay figures (76 words)

Percentage increases on lowest basic rates (by agreements covered). ...

Full-time weekly average earnings (17 words)

All workers£592.70All male£651.30All female£501.00Managers£880.00Professionals£793.50Associate professional£612.50Admin & secretarial£410.40Skilled/craft£497.80Services£351.80Sales£325.60Operatives£460.60Other manual£357.40 ...

Average earnings indices (including bonuses) (64 words)

Earnings index* for whole economy% annual riseWhole economyManufac-turingServicesPrivate sectorPublic sectorMar (r) 2008 135.54.74.65.14.93.8April (r)133.92.92.63.32.83.7May (r)135.23.33.83.33.43.3June135.83.42.53.73.62.9July136.23.62.83.93.54.0August136.63.22.93.43.13.6September137.03.13.03.22.84.0October 137.33.62.93.93.63.8November 136.82.62.32.92.24.3December136.22.91.83.32.73.9Jan 2009 134.7-0.31.5-0.7-1.23.7February 135.4-1.81.0-2.2-2.63.7March (r)137.11.20.31.20.63.4April (r)138.53.42.43.43.43.6May (p)138.22.2-0.22.71.83.6Headline rate** ...

Other pay analysts (22 words)

Industrial Relations Services (median, three months to end June 2009)1.3%Incomes Data Services (median, three months to end May 2009)2.0% ...

Inflation forecasts (20 words)

Fourth quarter 2009 ...

Prices (14 words)

Retail prices index (RPI), Jan ’87=100% annual increasesRPIRPI excl. mortgages May 2008215.14.34.4June216.84.64.8July216.55.05.3August217.24.85.2September218.45.05.5October217.74.24.7November216.03.0 3.9December212.90.92.8Jan 2009210.10.12.4February211.40.02.5March211.3-0.42.2April211.5-1.21.7May212.8-1.11.6June213.4-1.61.0 ...

Bargaining news

Tesco agrees 2.5% pay and works council (539 words)

USDAW has won a pay deal of 2.5% at Britain’s biggest supermarket Tesco, alongside an agreement to begin formal discussions on setting up a ...

RMT members reject harmonisation terms (237 words)

RMT rail union members have overwhelmingly rejected the terms proposed by Network Rail for bringing maintenance workers onto a single structure for pay and ...

BT unfreezes on pay (493 words)

BT will not impose a wage freeze on its staff this year, following lengthy and intense negotiations with the CWU communication workers union that ...

Pay deals on Payline (292 words)

Pay deals registered on Payline in June and July from the public sector include the Home Office, giving 4.67% on basic pay for those ...

Further education wins increase in pay offer (254 words)

Further education unions have succeeded in getting the Association of Colleges to increase its offer to 1.5% on all scales and allowances. UNISON public ...

UNISON protests deportation of SOAS cleaners (92 words)

UNISON has condemned the actions of the UK Borders Agency in deporting six cleaners from the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in ...

Alliance & Leicester win pay from Santander (183 words)

CWU banking union members at Alliance & Leicester have voted overwhelmingly to accept a 20-month pay deal from Santander, the Spanish parent bank that ...

Wage freezes are not the only story, data shows (286 words)

With the debate hotting up over the call for pay freezes in the public sectors, LRD’s Payline database shows justifications based on the idea ...

Pay deal on table for firefighters (114 words)

Firefighters’ union the FBU is consulting members on a pay offer from employers of 1.25% across the board from 1 July 2009. ...

Unions welcome blacklist action (79 words)

Unions have issued statements welcoming government plans to outlaw the blacklisting of trade union members. Dave Prentis, general secretary of UNISON, said: “UNISON applauds ...

Retirement age recommendation (103 words)

The Commons committee on work and pensions has recommended that the 2006 regulation that permits employers to force people into retirement at 65 should ...

Climate change project (79 words)

The Climate Outreach and Information Network (COIN) has launched a project aimed at mobilising the trade union movement on climate change. ...

Pensions on Payline (113 words)

LRD is collecting data on private sector pensions from union reps and officials. The data will be analysed and made available on Payline for ...

Equality news

Bargaining for lesbian, gay and bisexual workers (434 words)

Despite the 2003 introduction of the Employment Equality (Sexual Orientation) Regulations which ban discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation, lesbian, gay and bisexual workers ...

Older workers at risk of poverty in cuts (305 words)

Over a quarter of those aged over 50 are afraid their age will be used to force them out of work if their employer ...

Equality reps hold other union roles (129 words)

Equality reps are a mixture of new union activists, current reps adding to their role and former reps continuing their union engagement, according to ...

Diversity still important in recession (128 words)

Employers still see diversity as an important priority despite the downturn, according to the latest benchmarking survey from Opportunity Now, the business-led organisation that ...

Recruitment and organisation news

Unions welcome revised time off code of practice from Acas (438 words)

The TUC has welcomed new aspects of the revised code of practice on time off for trade union duties and activities produced last month ...

Learning and training news

NEET statistics (277 words)

New statistics from the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF) on young people not in employment, education or training, the so-called “neets”, paint ...

Skills Academy (200 words)

Proskills, the sector skills council for the process and manufacturing sector, has announced that it has secured a National Skills Academy “which will go ...

Leaders in Learning (66 words)

The TUC’s learning organisation, unionlearn, has produced a new publication called Leaders in learning detailing case study evidence of how employers and unions working ...

European news

Smallest possible increase for French minimum wage (403 words)

The French national minimum wage, known by its French initials as the SMIC, has been increased by 1.25% – the minimum according to the ...

Netherlands minimum wage (145 words)

The national minimum wage in the Netherlands also went up on 1 July, increasing by 1.26% from the previous €1,381.20 a month to the ...

Parental leave rules to be revised by EU after new union agreement (425 words)

Parental leave will increase from three to four months, and parents on leave will enjoy additional protection under a new law agreed by unions ...

Law - TUPE

Transfers – the basic legal rules (154 words)

The Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations 2006 (TUPE) state that, when a business or part of a business is transferred from one ...

Transfers - the key developments (45 words)

• TUPE does not require employers to consult with transferred staff following an acquisition (case 1). ...

Employer only has to consult staff pre-transfer (691 words)

Case 1: The facts ...

Law - Dismissal

Dismissals – the basic legal rules (276 words)

Employees dismissed unfairly can go to a tribunal if they have been working for at least a year. There are special rules for retirement ...

Dismissals – (80 words)

• The “range of reasonable responses” test does not apply to constructive dismissals (case 1). ...

the key developments (80 words)

• The “range of reasonable responses” test does not apply to constructive dismissals (case 1). ...

Constructive dismissal test (863 words)

Case 1: The facts ...

Thorough investigations (640 words)

Case 2: The facts ...

What is the final straw? (512 words)

Case 3: The facts ...

Law - Redundancy

Redundancy – the basic legal rules (229 words)

A redundancy situation exists where an employer closes or intends to close the workplace or reduce the number of employees doing a particular kind ...

Redundancy - the key developments (51 words)

• Once waived, state immunity is not relevant to statutory interpretation but may amount to a special circumstance under TULR(C)A (case 1). ...

State waived immunity from consultation (628 words)

Case 1: The facts ...

CBI redundancy proposals (273 words)

The CBI proposes shortening the statutory 90-day redundancy consultation period (where 100 or more employees are at risk of redundancy). The employer body believes ...

Health & safety news

Gangmaster licensing Bill for construction proposed (304 words)

Construction unions are backing a law currently going through parliament that seeks to extend existing gangmasters legislation to the construction industry. ...

CWU union calls for tough action by HSE (230 words)

Communication workers criticised the Health and Safety Executive’s (HSE) new strategy (see Workplace Report, June 2009, p. 14) at the CWU annual conference last ...

Stop this safety rep victimisation (126 words)

Unions are campaigning against the victimisation of a safety rep sacked just for doing her job. ...

Safety failures at turbine manufacturer (93 words)

Vestas Blades, a manufacturer that makes onshore wind turbines, has been fined for health and safety breaches. ...

Railways caught short on toilet provision (104 words)

Toilet facilities for drivers are so bad on Britain’s railways that drivers often carry an empty plastic bottle, ASLEF train drivers’ union has said. ...

Tower crane register (57 words)

The HSE will launch a consultation this month on the tower crane registration scheme, with a view to bringing in new regulation by April ...

Health & safety - HSE Monitor

Record low for work deaths, but more to do (299 words)

Unions and safety campaigners welcomed the fall in the official annual work death figures, but warned that there is still much to do. ...

HSE failings exposed on construction fatalities (268 words)

UCATT construction union has seized on evidence revealed at the Work and Pensions Select Committee last month to raise concerns about the way the ...

HSE rules out further Worker Safety Advisors (133 words)

The HSE will not resurrect the Worker Safety Advisor (WSA) scheme, but it is planning to promote worker involvement in small businesses. ...

Nuclear safety (173 words)

Nuclear power plants have had thousands of leaks, breakdowns or other events over the past seven years, but the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate (NII), part ...

HSE ignored “for eight years” (93 words)

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) prosecuted an aerospace engineering company after it had ignored warnings from the safety body for eight years. ...

Features

Health and safety round up (3181 words)

This year health and safety has been overshadowed by the economic downturn. There have been few major legislative changes, but some significant additions to ...

London Weighting and the London Living Wage (1692 words)

With employers looking to trim wage bills in a range of different ways during the current economic crisis, it is likely that allowances such ...