Warwick 2
National Policy Forum -
Warwick2: Highlights
This document highlights the
key policies arising from the National Policy Forum agreement in
Warwick, which would be implemented during a fourth term of a
Labour Government.
Public Services
- Labour will support councils in implementing the equal pay for
work of equal value agenda:
“Labour will continue to
insist that Councils meet their current and future obligations to
implement terms and conditions consistent with the principles of
equal pay for work of equal value. We will support this process by
continuing to allow some financial flexibility, in the form of
capitalisation to councils facing these pressures subject to fiscal
conditions allowing this.”
- Labour will ensure that all hospitals give consideration to
in-house cleaning contracts:
“All hospitals must give
full consideration to in-house options for their cleaning contracts
with a view to maintaining and developing critical public sector
capacity in the management of cleaning and hospital hygiene.”
Public Services –
Pensions
- Labour will extend the access to the NHS pension scheme for
staff transferring to social enterprises:
“In the NHS, the Government
will seek to extend entitlements to NHS pensions to those staff
transferring to social enterprises in the Primary Community sector
as part of moves to reform that sector of NHS provision and give
front-line staff more control over services as set out in the Darzi
review.”
Health
- Carers will be given practical assistance that supports their
paid employment:
“Labour is committed to
ensuring that all carers are given practical assistance which
allows them to get and maintain a job if that is what they
want.”
Children &
Schools
- Labour will increase the take up of free school meals:
“We are taking action to
increase take-up of free school meals, investing to improve the
quality of school meals and we will keep the nutritional value and
cost of school meals under review.”
- Labour will implement a new negotiating body for school support
staff and replace term-time only contracts with 52 week
contracts:
“We will improve progression
and consistency in terms and conditions for support staff through
their new negotiating body. In establishing the new body it is our
intention that it will resolve the long-standing issues around term
time working as a priority.”
- The two tier code application will be expanded into other
education facilities:
“We recognise that colleges,
universities and academies are responsible for their own human
resources policies. Nonetheless, we recognise that for many
providers of contracted services such as cleaning and catering in
these institutions similar issues of two tier workforces arises as
in other public services. The Government will therefore actively
engage with the relevant employers’ organisations and seek to
introduce the application of two tier principles, based on the code
of practice, in these sectors and within the existing planned
resources of the institutions. We will also ensure that the
two-tier Code of Practice is rigorously applied and enforced in
state maintained schools.”
Skills
- A right to request time off for training:
“Labour will introduce a
right to request time for training in 2010, covering over 20
millions workers, after consulting this year.”
- Labour will review the pay of apprentices:
“Apprentices under 18, and
over 19 in their first year, are exempt from the NMW. Labour has
asked the Low Pay Commission to review this exemption.”
Fairness at
Work
- Best practice for workplace equality, environmental and
learning reps:
“We will ask ACAS to produce
best practice guidance on workplace equality, environmental and
learning reps.”
- Changes to internal balloting for the election of trade union
officials:
“New technology has the
potential to allow membership organisations to give a more
effective voice to their members. The government will review the
rules governing elections of officers in voluntary, professional
and union organisations.”
National Minimum
Wage
- More penalties will be introduced for employers failing to pay
the minimum wage:
“Through the Employment
Bill, we are toughening up the enforcement regime by introducing
new penalties for employers who do not pay the minimum wage with a
fairer system of arrears for workers not paid the minimum
wage.”
- Employee tips will be paid in addition to the minimum
wage:
“We believe tips should be
additional to the minimum wage therefore we will ensure in the
future that tips may not count towards the minimum wage.”
- Minimum wage may be extended from 22 to 21 year olds:
“The Government has asked
the Low Pay Commission to report on what changes could be made to
the minimum wage to support younger workers. The Low Pay Commission
has supported a separate youth rate but has in the past recommended
that the adult rate start at 21 and not 22 as at present. If the
Low Pay Commission continues to make this recommendation the
government should accept it.”
Sector Forums
- New sector forums will be established in areas of the economy
where there are low paid employees:
“The Labour government will
bring together the social partners and others for “sector forums”
in areas of the economy where low pay and low skills are most
concentrated. They will discuss what can be done to improve
productivity, health and safety as well as pay, skills and
pensions. As a start the Government will look at the social care
sector, contract cleaning, hospitality and betting.
Construction/Health
& Safety
“Our policy will be firmly
evidence based and we will study evidence of abuses in sectors such
as construction to ensure the most appropriate form of regulation
and whether to extend the GLA regime to construction.”
- Prevention of employees being wrongly registered as self
employed:
“we will put in place a
series of measures that will ensure no one is falsely classified
self-employed, these will include using procurement rules on all
publicly-funded projects. The HMRC enforcement regime will be
applied vigorously and proactively in eradicating false
employment.”
Procurement/Manufacturing
- Increasing public procurement to protect the remaining Remploy
factories:
“It is essential that
government both nationally and locally provide Remploy with the
opportunity to compete for public sector work using the European
Directive on Public Procurement Article 19 (Regulation 7 of UK
Public Contracts Reg).”
Family Friendly
- Giving parents of children under 16 the legal right to take
time off:
“Following Imelda Walsh’s
review into flexible working, we will extend the right to request
to parents of children up to the age of 16, giving more parents the
legal right to ask to work flexibly while ensuring that employers
can continue to prioritise parents and carers when considering
whether to grant requests.”
Carers
- More support for carers to balance their caring
responsibilities with paid employment:
“As we look over the next
year at the options for securing a better system of funding for all
social care, we must obtain a fairer deal for those in care and
carers that provides support where it is most needed, that
effectively allows carers to combine work and care, and that
provides financial support to those who face hardship.”
Migrant Workers/Racial
Intolerance
- Added protection for migrant workers:
“We will penalise employers
who employ illegal workers, with rigorous enforcement action and
heavy fines. We are determined to tackle the employment and
exploitation of illegal migrant workers..”
- Increased protection and support for front line staff who are
abused at work:
“We will work with all
sectors that employ frontline staff and with unions to tackle
violence, threats and abuse against people at work. This is totally
unacceptable and we will promote the use of the whole range of the
criminal justice system to tackle such criminal acts, including the
use of anti-social behaviours powers or custodial sentences where
appropriate.”
Equality
- A new duty on public bodies to meet equality objectives:
“To help make progress in
our equality objectives, we will place a new equality duty on
public bodies which will bring together the three existing duties
covering race, disability and gender and extend to gender
reassignment, age, sexual orientation age and religion or
belief.”
- A new equality audit requirement on public bodies:
“The Equality Duty will
require public bodies to give due regard to the need to tackle
discrimination and promote equality through their purchasing
functions. We will use this purchasing power to help private sector
contractors to contribute to the delivery of our public policy
objectives of greater equality.”
- The development of workplace equality representatives:
“Workplace equality
representatives can work with both the workplace and management to
develop best practice. We will develop the role of trade union
equality representatives through the Union Modernisation Fund,
which is providing approximately £1.5m of support and we will ask
ACAS to produce best practice guidance on the role of workplace
equality representatives including time off, facilities and
bargaining on equality issues.”
Rail &
Transport
- Better ticket co-ordination:
“We will improve
coordination of other modes of transport through the expansion of
initiations such as the OYSTER card system, travel cards and
PlusBus in both urban centres and rural areas.”
Housing
- Increasing the role of Local Authorities to provide council
housing:
“Labour recognises the need,
particularly in a more difficult housing market, to have a mixed
economy of housing providers and believes that local authorities
and ALMOs, as well as housing associations, have a key role to play
in the future of affordable housing provision.”
“Councils will be allowed to
apply for social housing grants formerly reserved for housing
associations to enable them to be future providers of social
housing.”
Political Department
September 2008