Agenda item

It was noted that actions Jun22-Ac1 and June22-Ac3 were in-hand.

June22-Ac2, Trade Union Facilities Time, figures on grievances: Richard Hand reported that he had obtained figures on grievances for West Berkshire. There were currently five live grievance cases. One grievance case had resulted in a settlement and therefore not progressed. Another case involved a staff member who had left and therefore the process had not progressed. One of the cases had involved the Trade Union defending a member of staff against a grievance and this highlighted that it was not just members lodging grievances that was dealt with, although the majority of cases were.  There had been several cases of informal grievances that had not been escalated.

Richard Hand explained that the escalation of grievances was not encouraged due to the process being very time consuming. Richard Hand explained that he had attended a national conference and anecdotally there seemed to be a growing number of grievances nationally. Grievance cases did seem to be rising and it was thought that this might be due to resilience post covid and staff members feeling overlooked, when workload and expectations had risen.

Richard Hand reported that there had also been a rise in grievances being lodged without the Trade Union being consulted. The guidance was always for advice to be sought from the Trade Union in the first instance to see if a matter could be resolved informally.