Two out of five recognition agreements voluntary

The statutory recognition process has resulted in a significant number of voluntary recognition agreements, according to the Central Arbitration Committee (CAC), which oversees the process.

Writing in the CAC’s 2012-13 annual report, chair Sir Michael Burton said that, since the CAC began its work, some 163 cases that started life as statutory applications have resulted in voluntary agreements.

Adding these to the 249 deals reached after completing the statutory procedure suggests that the total number of agreements reached as at 31 March 2013 is 412. This is around half of the number of applications that unions have submitted.

The report shows that the number of statutory recognition applications rose for the second year in a row in 2012-13, with 54 applications compared with 43 in the previous year and 28 two years ago. A “substantial number” of applications for union recognition in residential care facilities contributed to the overall rise in statutory claims.

The last few weeks have seen one successful statutory recognition bid and one failed one. The Unite general union won recognition for some 500 workers at Walkers Snack Foods, Coventry. A ballot of the workers returned a 76% vote in favour of recognition.

However, the GMB general union failed to win a statutory ballot at Cleveland Cable in Kent.

www.cac.gov.uk/media/pdf/5/s/The_CAC_Annual_Report_2012-2013.pdf