Consultation and response to Health Service Group
Dear LAS UNISON branch member,
The NHS Pay Review Body (PRB) has recommended a 1% consolidated pay increase for all NHS Staff on Agenda for Change contracts. The Government has accepted the recommendation and pay for NHS staff will be increased from 1 April 2017. This is the consultation on how UNISON should respond. We want to know how members in our branch feel about the annual pay award and where you want UNISON, at branch, region and national levels, to put the most resource.
This is about the focus of national and regional UNISON resources. The Health Service Group Executive has not received soundings that there is the level of support necessary for a successful industrial action ballot so formally recommends that our efforts should instead be dedicated to an “earnings maximisation” strategy. However, we are running this consultation to check that this judgement is correct. If branches choose the “earnings max” strategy, UNISON will dedicate resources to branches to deliver projects on those lines.
UNISON is using “earnings max” as a shorthand for campaigns the Health Group could run to improve member earnings. This could include country-wide work such as pursuing a national approach to reprofiling band 1 jobs into band 2, regional projects to identify and resource high profile rebanding campaigns, as well as training and support for branches to pursue local campaigns in areas such as: living wage claim; local recruitment and retention premiums; challenging downbanding/supporting banding reviews; holiday pay and sick pay based on accurate earnings; and improved shift patterns.
If branches choose national industrial action to challenge the 2017/18 pay award, our national resource will be used to provide the administrative and logistical support needed for a national ballot.
OPTION A – Earnings maximisation
OPTION B – Resource a national ballot to challenge the 2017/18 pay award
LAS UNISON is now consulting with all our members on Agenda for Change Contracts for a branch-level decision.
This will also be on the Agenda for our Branch Committee in April.
LAS UNISON must respond by Tuesday 2nd May. This is so there is enough time to compile responses from all branches for the Health Service Group Executive to consider before Health Conference.
Please speak to your Workplace representatives/Senior Sector Representatives or email me at the address below.
Kind regards
Eddie Brand
Branch Secretary
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