Formal pay claim sent to BBC by BECTU NUJ and AEEU
14th April 2000
Mr Gareth Jones
Director of Personnel
Room 206
BBC, 16 Langham Street
Dear Mr Jones,
PAY AND CONDITIONS REVIEW 2000
I am writing on behalf of the joint unions to set out the claim for an increase to pay and associated allowances, and improvements to the conditions of service. We would expect any agreement reached between us to apply to all staff inside the BBC including Resources Limited, but excluding Worldwide, for which there are separate bargaining arrangements.
Pay
Our members are aware that this year the BBC has been given an unexpected licence fee settlement. In a year when the increase was supposed to be 0.2% (that is to say, RPI minus 1%) it will actually go up from £101 to £104, a rise of nearly 3%. The settlement was the result of a long campaign by the joint unions and the staff which involved lobbying the government and politicians of all parties with the goal of proper funding of the BBC for the digital age. The BBC is now in the happy circumstance of knowing that its income is fixed at RPI plus 1.5% for the next six years. Clearly much of this money needs to be spent on new programmes for the digital channels but, equally clearly, high quality programmes are only made by high quality, well motivated and well rewarded staff.
We welcome the open and transparent style of the new Director General, Greg Dyke. We note the financial information about the salaries of the Executive Board published in the annual report, but we believe that this transparency and provision of salary information should be extended downwards to senior managers. We would make the same point as last year about the treatment of senior managers and the Director General; we believe that their pay increase should be no greater than that received by the staff.
In the light of the above, our claim for 2000 is for a substantial percentage increase over and above the rate of inflation, with a minimum of £1,000 per year. The increase is to apply to all pay-related allowances, including the floors of the salary bands and London Weighting.
Pensions & Redeployment
We would seek the continuation of the favourable discounting of pensions for those taking premature retirement or facing redundancy. It is currently due to expire on 31st December 2000, and we believe it should be extended to 31st December 2002. The agreement reached at ACAS in 1998 allowed for a re-deployment period of five months following selection for redundancy, and given its success in helping staff avoid redundancy (and saving the BBC many thousands of pounds) we believe it should now be made a permanent arrangement.
Performance Related Pay
Performance Related Pay has been an area where we have disagreed in the past, not least because there are no clear targets which, once achieved, can guarantee that an individual will receive PRP. In the eyes of all staff PRP has failed to deliver a fair and understandable salary system and because of that we oppose the idea of putting any money into PRP. If the BBC insist on siphoning money from the general salary increase into PRP then we will be instructing our members to boycott the appraisal process.
Fixed Term Contracts
Following last year's pay claim you have still to respond to us on the issue of Fixed Term Contracts. In 1999 we identified problems in the application of these contracts across the Corporation. In particular, the World Service felt it could operate a different, and in our view a discriminatory, policy from other directorates. Our claim this year is that all of those on Fixed Term Contracts should be able to join the Final Salary Pension Scheme and be eligible for BBC redundancy pay on the same terms as those staff on Continuing Contracts. Currently staff have to do five years in the same job on Fixed Term Contracts and then be offered work for another twelve months to then qualify for a Continuing Contract. We would claim that after three years of continuous employment they should be offered Continuing Contracts.
Parental Leave and Time off for Dependants
In the last six months legislation has conferred certain rights on workers employed in the UK, including Parental Leave and Dependency Leave. There is obviously a great deal of detail to be discussed about the implementation of this, but we would claim that half of the Parental Leave entitlement should be paid and that as a principle the Dependants Leave should be paid.
Meal Breaks
Meal breaks have become more important to staff following the introduction of the Working Time legislation, but we feel some areas across all of the directorates are taking advantage of the six hours between breaks. Because of this, we believe that the maximum number of hours between meal breaks should be reduced to four hours and that any member of staff who has a meal break should be paid for that break. In particular, part time workers who work a full shift, for example one day on, one day off, should have paid meal breaks.
Night Working
Developing the issues of more family friendly policies as they apply to rostering and working time, we believe that following on from the changes introduced by the Working Time Directive, night working is now seen as disruptive to the family life of an individual and detrimental to their personal health. Other employers in the broadcasting industry have recognised and accepted this in agreements recently concluded with the unions. We would claim that anyone who works a night shift should then have a minimum of three days off and that anyone aged 50 or over should not be compelled to work night shifts. Because of the debilitating effect of regularly working night shifts anyone who does so should only have to work 35 hours per week. The payment for working night hours should be increased by 10% and the amount paid for working between 06.00 and 08.00 on the end of a night shift should be at the same rate as the hours worked between 0400 and 0600.
Christmas and New Year Leave
Under the current arrangement staff receive a payment for working on Christmas Day, Boxing Day or New Year's Day in Scotland. This payment should be increased £100.00 and staff working on any or all of the above days should receive it.
Summary
The pay claim as set out above is detailed and covers several aspects of conditions of service. I believe it would be helpful to arrange a meeting of the NJC in order for us to set out the arguments in support of our claim. I look forward to hearing from you.
Yours sincerely,
LUKE CRAWLEY
Supervisory Official
20 April 2000
