Item 2 - Funding for union facilities time

Schools Forum – 19.1.2015

Recommendation
The Schools Forum is asked: -
  1. To approve the method of funding to enable the continuation of the Trade Union/Professional Association facilities time.

  1. To approve de-delegation for maintained schools at either:
a)£3.12per pupil (maintained schools) for local matters which would cover the full costs;
b)£3.00 per pupil (maintained schools) for local matters which is the same rate as in 2014/15 and would mean that the amount of facility time would need to be reduced accordingly
c)Another rate, recognising that available facility time would need to change accordingly
3.To decide whether to provide funding for national executive members for the NUT and the NASUWT
4.If (3) above is agreed, to then agree a rate to contribute towards the costs of the NUT and NASUWT national executive members of:
a)£0.40 per pupil
b)£0.29 (the per pupil charge in 2014/15)
c)Another rate
5.To approve a payment from the High needs block for Union Facilities time at the same rate charged to maintained schools in line with the decisions above (if the per pupil rate of £3.12 is agreed this would be £4,037)

Members of Forum allowed to vote :-

Onlymaintained primary representatives can vote on primary school de-delegation. Only maintained secondary representatives can vote on secondary school de-delegation. Academies members cannot vote on de-delegation.

1.Background

1.1 Funding for facilities time for Trade Unions and Teachers Professional Associations is a matter for individual schools. In 2013/14 and 2014/15, the Schools Forum took the decision to de delegate the funding and the Council administered the funding on behalf of the Forum. Additionally, working with the Teacher Professional Associations, the Council offered a funding agreement to Academies and Colleges in the Borough so that they could benefit from centralised arrangements for facilities time.

1.2 The Department for Education (DfE)issued guidance about facilities time at the end of January 2014 (after the 2014 deadline for submitting information to the DfE) about de delegation, and this can be found at

1.3 The cost of facilities time is calculated on a per pupil basis, and the forum will need to submit this information to the DfE by 21 January 2015.

2. Purpose of facilities time

2.1 Croydon has established good working relationships with our Trade Union and Professional Association colleagues and has valued their support in seeking fair resolution to problems. They form part of the Working Group with Croydon HR to draft and revise and agree policies and procedures. They attend regular consultative meetings with the department and provide constructive feedback. The Trade unions and Professional Associations have also been instrumental in helping to limit the number of employment tribunal claims through their involvement in seeking early resolution of conflict.

2.2 Providing sufficient release time for the Trade Union and Professional Association representatives, allows schools to meet their statutory responsibilities to provide release time to support individual employee relations cases and to consult in cases of redundancy, academisation transfers and/or changing terms and conditions. Current arrangements facilitate this in a structured way, minimising operational disruption.

3. Cost: local representation

3.1 The costs of facilities time are based on:

- the number of members in the Teaching Professional Associations;

-A contribution towards the central budget for the local secretaries of the support staff unions.

3.2 Following consultation with the Teaching Professional Associations in 2013/14 regarding the amount of release time facilities release time, the amount of release time is now shown as a maximum amount of time (as it is dependent on funding levels) and this maximum amount of time has been reduced from previous levels.

(See appendix 1 for full details).

3.3 Membership of the Teaching Professional Associations is counted in January of each year, and the Professional Associations provide the numbers of their members in state funded establishments in the Borough to the Local Authority. The figures available for schools forum and the corresponding release time are therefore those from January 2014 andare as follows:

NUT: 2,486 (4.8 days) (Jan 2013 – 4.8 days)

NASUWT: 1,292(2.4 days) (Jan 2013 – 2.2 days)

ATL: 457 (0.8 days) (Jan 2013 – 0.5 days)

The increased membership has led to an overall increase in facilities time for these Professional Associations from 7.5 days to 8 days.

3.4 Release time for the above Teaching Professional Associations is based on actual salary costs which inevitably vary between representatives. Using the cost (including on costs of 22%) of the most expensive representative, the cost of this group of representatives is £98,139. The increased cost compared to the previous financial year reflects the increased amount of time and the 2014 pay award.

3.5 In addition facilities time of 19 days per financial year at a cost of £185 per day will be available for NAHT and ASCL totalling £7,030

3.6 As in 2014/15, schools are asked to contribute towards the cost of facilities time for support staff unions (Unison, GMB and Unite). The Council recognises that as the employer of staff in community and voluntary controlled schools, it should carry the cost of the collective (collective consultation and collective bargaining) aspects of facilities time. However, schools are now being asked to contribute towards costs in relation to individual employee relations casework. Facilities time for the support staff unions is not currentlycalculated in the same way as for teaching professional associations because of the collective responsibilities. The cost has therefore been calculated based on the costs of the local secretaries of these unions. It is estimated that 40% of the time relates to collective matters, 60% to individual casework and that school staff comprise 45% of the total membership. The total funding being sought from schools, academies and colleges is therefore the cost of the local corporate staff side leads x 45% x 60% = £44,000.

In the event that this contribution to funding is not agreed then the Council will have to review the facilities time arrangements, both for collective consultation and collective bargaining, and in relation to individual casework) for its support staff unions (Unison, GMB and Unite); and/or seek approval from Members for an amendment to its budgetary provision.

3.7 In addition, there are administrative costs payable to the Council’s HR section for running the facilities arrangements of £5,000 per annum.

Table 1 – Total cost of 2015-6Local Union Facility Time

NUT, NASUWT, ATL / £98,139 / £91,257 in 2014/15
NAHT, ASCL / £7,030 / No change
Support staff unions / £44,000 / £40,500 in 2014/15
Administrative cost / £5,000 / £2,000 in 2014/15
Total cost / £154,169
Variance from last financial year (+ or - %) / +£13,382

4.De-delegation unit rates

4.1 Decisions on de-delegation can only be made by maintained schools. De-delegation cannot apply to academy schools. The cost of the union facility time service is being calculated upon a per pupil basis, which is consistent with previous financial years. Table 2 below shows how this rate has been calculated.

Table 2 – Pupil rates for Union Facility Time 2014/15

Calculation / Pupils / Union Facility Time cost
Total cost of Union Facility Time (all schools) / A / £154,169
Pupil numbers (R-Y11) all schools including High Needs provision / B / 49,362
Pupil numbers (R-Y11) maintained schools / C / 24,981
Ratio of maintained pupils to all pupils in the borough / D = C/B / 0.51
De-delegation amount to be sought from maintained schools / E = A x D / £78,021
Rate per pupil
(Equates to £2.13 for teacher professional associations and £0.89 for support staff trade unions plus £0.10 administrative cost) / F = E/C / 3.12

4.2 Academies schools and 6th form colleges have the opportunity to buy into this service at the same rate as maintained schools via a funding agreement.

4.3 As High Needs provision is not within the schools block, the cost of facilities time for these schools is not part of the scope of this decision. Union facility time funding cannot be de-delegated for pupils in High Needs provision. Table 3 below sets out the cost of union facility time for these provision types, which would be a charge to the High Needs Block in 2014-15.

Table 3 – Cost of union facility time in maintained schools High Needs provision 2015/16

Provision type / Places
Maintained special schools / 824
Pupil Referral Units / 198
Enhanced Learning Provision (in maintained schools) / 272
Total Pupil at maintained establishments not in scope of de-delegation / 1294
Total value at £3.12 x 1294 / £4,037

4.4 It is recognised that schools forum may choose to approve a lesser (or greater) amount than this. If this happens, then the amount of release time will be recalculated in line with the funding available.

4.5 This process will in any case be necessary if not all the academies and colleges elect to sign the funding agreement.This will not affect the conduct of employee relations in maintained schools and academies and colleges that purchase the funding agreement. However, academies and colleges that do not sign the funding agreement will not be able to conduct employee relations cases during the school day as they will not have purchased the necessary release time.

5.National representation

5.1The NUT and NASUWT both have national executive members. In 2014/15, schools forum agreed to make a contribution towards the cost of this, rather than meeting the full costs. The full costs would have resulted in a per pupil cost of £1.29, and the cost agreed was £0.29 per pupil. The resultant funding was split equally between the two associations. It is recommended that this be increased to £0.40per pupil in 2015/16.

6.Options available

  1. To cease the union facilities time arrangements
  2. To approve de delegation of £3.12pp(as described above) for the basis of de delegation and for the funding agreement for local facilities time
  3. To approve an alternative per pupil amount of funding for local facilities time and to determine what that should be
  4. To decide whether, at additional cost, support should be made available for national representation. The forum must also determine the amount of per pupil funding it will approve for this purpose. If approved for de delegation, this would be included as an additional option in the academies and colleges funding agreement.

Recommendation
The Schools Forum is asked: -
1.To approve the method of funding to enable the continuation of the Trade Union/Professional Association facilities time.
2.To approve de-delegation for maintained schools at either:
a)£3.12 per pupil (maintained schools) for local matters which would cover the full costs;
b)£3.00 per pupil (maintained schools) for local matters which is the same rate as in 2014/15 and would mean that the amount of facility time would need to be reduced accordingly
c)Another rate, recognising that available facility time would need to change accordingly
3.To decide whether to provide funding for national executive members for the NUT and the NASUWT
4.If (3) above is agreed, to then agree a rate to contribute towards the costs of the NUT and NASUWT national executive members of:
a)£0.40 per pupil
b)£0.29 (the per pupil charge in 2014/15)
c)Another rate
d)To approve a payment from the High needs block for Union Facilities time at the same rate charged to maintained schools in line with the decisions above (if the per pupil rate of £3.12 is agreed this would be £4,037)
-

Author’s NameCathy Brearley / Maria Norfolk

Author’s job title HR Business Partner, Schools/ Finance Business Partner CFL

Date6 January 2015

Appendix 1: Release time – teaching professional associations

Maximum release time (from Croydon Schools HR Handbook)

Membership of Organisation
(ASCL, ATL, NAHT, NASUWT, NUT and VOICE only) / Release Time per week
Under 300 members
300-399
400-499
500-599
600-699
700-799
800-899
900-999
1000-1099
1100-1199
1200-1299
1300-1399
1400-1499
1500-1599
1600-1699
1700-1799
1800-1899
1900-1999
More than 2000 members
And so on / 0.5 days
0.6 days
0.8 days
1.0 days
1.2 days
1.4 days
1.6 days
1.8 days
2.0 days
2.2 days
2.4 days
2.6 days
2.8 days
3.0 days
3.2 days
3.4 days
3.6 days
3.8 days
4.0 days
And so on

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