Agenda and minutes

The Forum considered a report from UNISON which expressed their concern regarding the consultation process in relation to the restructuring of Housing Services.  The concern related to the process.

UNISON’s concerns related to two main issues:

·                     The consultation process was flawed and, in particular, the original documentation provided on Monday 1 December 2008 for consultation was inaccurate.  In addition, the information had been distributed to all employees, prior to informing those in the posts at risk of deletion.

·                     There had been a failure by management to respond to reasonable requests for information and documentation.  The Union questioned the decision by the management of the service not to conduct basic feasibility studies, the reluctance to provide any relevant evidence to substantiate the deletion of posts, and the reallocation of residual tasks to the remaining employees, as identified in the consultation document.

The Union indicated that it was requesting the following action:

·                     That all outstanding information requested by UNISON during the consultation process be supplied within a reasonable time frame (five working days); and

·                     that the consultation process be revisited as it was in breach of 1.1 of the Protocol for the Managing Organisational Change policy and also the Recognition and Procedural Agreement section 15.

The Forum also received a response from Housing Services to UNISON’s concerns in relation to the HaRP restructure together with some appendices, the confidential element of which was not discussed at the meeting.  The report set out the actions taken in relation to restructuring in Housing Services arising from the introduction of the Civica IT system, and addressed the concerns raised by UNISON regarding compliance with the protocol for managing organisational change.  Appendices to the report contained some of the the minutes of Housing Joint Committee meetings that referred to the HaRP restructuring, the report of 1 December 2008 provided to all staff and unions, the management response to the Unions dated 16 January 2009, the Issues Log, the Consultation Timetable, and Adult and Housing Joint Committee information up to 23 February 2009.

The Employees’ Side raised the following points.

·                     During discussion of this item, the Employee Representatives stated that, in their view, issues had arisen at the start of the consultation process on 1 December 2008 and that requests for information had been made subsequent to that meeting.  The information before the Members did not include minutes of the Housing Group Joint Committees on 22 May and 17 July 2008, although there was mention of the content of these at subsequent meetings despite union members not being in attendance.  The minutes of a meeting held on 19 June 2008 referred to the need for a review of the staff structure, however union representatives had not been in attendance.  A number of the minutes stated that UNISON did not attend, but they had not been invited.  UNISON indicated that the first point of contact should have been the Branch Administrator.  It was a request from a Branch Officer that had resulted in UNISON being invited.  Information was  ...  view the full minutes text for item

To note the attendance at this meeting of any duly appointed Reserve Members.

Reserve Members may attend meetings:-

(i)                 to take the place of an ordinary Member for whom they are a reserve;

(ii)               where the ordinary Member will be absent for the whole of the meeting; and

(iii)             the meeting notes at the start of the meeting at the item ‘Reserves’ that the Reserve Member is or will be attending as a reserve;

(iv)              if a Reserve Member whose intention to attend has been noted arrives after the commencement of the meeting, then that Reserve Member can only act as a Member from the start of the next item of business on the agenda after his/her arrival.

RESOLVED:  To note the attendance at this meeting of the following duly appointed Reserve Members:-

To receive declarations of personal or prejudicial interests, arising from business to be transacted at this meeting, from:

(a)               all Members of the Committee, Sub Committee, Panel or Forum;

(b)               all other Members present in any part of the room or chamber.

RESOLVED:  To note that the following interests were declared:

That the minutes of the meeting held on 1 April 2009 be taken as read and signed as a correct record.

RESOLVED:  That the minutes of the meeting held on 1 April 2009 be taken as read and signed as a correct record subject to the amendment of Minute 151 to remove all references to a Special meeting and to replace this in all instances with reference to a reconvened meeting.

To receive petitions (if any) submitted by members of the public/Councillors under the provisions of Advisory Panel and Consultative Forum Procedure Rule 14 (Part 4E of the Constitution).

RESOLVED:  To note that no public questions were put, or petitions or deputations received at this meeting under the provisions of the Advisory Panel and Consultative Forum Procedure Rules 16, 14 and 15 respectively (Part 4E of the Constitution).

Report from UNISON.

(See Recommendation 1).