Whilst there are of course many different opinions on how to fix broken pay systems in the civil service and beyond, there is unanimity on the need for reform. I’ve spent most of my adult life dealing with pay delegation and my first full-time union role was to support unions with the introduction of delegation, in what was then the Department for Social Security in 1993.
More than 30 years later, the basic system of pay delegation and the Treasury’s remit process remains intact. Few people – if anyone – who has had to try to make this system work would suggest its fit for purpose. Though it has served its primary purpose – control. Civil service pay is not an enabler for change or even a driver of performance, it is a cost to be managed.
This results in pay being uncompetitive, and prevents employers from having the ability to respond to pressures or flexibility to address their pressure points. For nearly two decades, most employers have been living hand to mouth, so strategy is thin on the ground. Employers that try to reform can spend years trying to persuade the Treasury, who have all the control but little responsibly for the outcome.
There are more than a hundred employers that bargain under this process. Multiply that by 30 years and its clear we’ve had no shortage of bargaining in the civil service. I’m a bargainer, it’s what I do. If I wasn’t general secretary of the FDA, I’d be selling used cars. But bargaining with employers, operating under the dead weight of the remit process, is like boxing with an octopus blindfolded. Occasionally you land a punch but most often you hit fresh air, then get thumped from four different sides.
Andrew Moretta, an academic who has authored a report for the Institute for Employment Rights, argued in these pages that unions like the FDA and Prospect, who want to explore alternatives such as a pay review body for the whole of the civil service, are “glorified friendly societies reduced to presenting arguments for improved terms and conditions of service to government appointed committees” and that “unions should be permitted to do what unions do: bargain on behalf of their members ‘in the shadow’ of effective industrial action”.
Essentially, Andrew is arguing for the status quo. We’ve had 30 years of that “free bargaining” process and I’m not sure there’s much evidence that it’s worked, either for employers or employees.
I’m assuming Andrew is a lecturer, because he goes on to lecture the FDA and Prospect with this piece of sage advice:
“Rather than pressing for a new PRB, the FDA and Prospect would serve the interests of ordinary civil servants better by lobbying for the repeal of the laws against strikes, the introduction of a comprehensive sectoral bargaining system and the revival of Whitley-style collective negotiation.”
The job of a union is to influence. Bargaining is one way of influencing, but the idea that it is the only way “in the shadow of effective industrial action” is frankly insulting.
We need our public services to work. They are desperate for reform, and pay reform will have to play a big part in that. That needs to be led by evidence, not by ideology. Binary arguments around bargaining and pay review bodies are only a distraction.
The FDA wants to explore a better way of determining pay for the civil service. One that can help the service address the deep-rooted issues that undermine how it performs and deliver fair reward for our members. Taking the heat out of pay bargaining, avoiding disputes and creating a tripartite approach is why the review bodies were set up in the first place.
There’s also the benefit of removing political decision making from choices around pay. The involvement of politics has demonstrably led to worse outcomes compared to the rest of the public sector – yes, the government remits the pay review body, but we know that the PRB’s recommendations focus on evidence and genuine concerns about workforce.
A truly independent pay review body – that considers evidence, including from the unions, and whose role is to support the service in addressing those issues – might be one way of doing this. I say might, because there has been legitimate criticism of the review body process and successive governments have undermined their role and independence. I come back to my point about influence. If we felt a proposal for a review body was flawed, and we’ve plenty of evidence of what those flaws look like, then we wouldn’t sign up. We can see how it might work, how it might drive better outcomes for employers and employees, but we also know, that like the bargaining process, the approach of government is key. If they’re committed to delivering a system that reflects the best of a review body process then it could work. If they’re not, then it won’t. That’s the reality.
So, let’s drop the ideology and focus on outcomes. That’s what good trade unions have always been about.