The NASUWT’s last meeting with the Brooke Weston Trust (BWT) was on 17 February 2016 where the NASUWT was able to reach agreement with BWT on a Trade Union Recognition Agreement (TURA).
The Union has been unable to reach agreement on a Trade Union Facility Time Agreement (TUFA) as the employer has consistently refused to pay into local authority facility time pots.
BWT School Teachers' Pay 2015/16 (Cost of Living Pay Award)
BWT has agreed a 1% cost of living award to all points on all scales, plus a discretionary 2% for M6 for the 2015/16 teachers’ pay award.
Pay and Appraisal Policies
The BWT Pay and Appraisal policies are unacceptable to the NASUWT as they do not comply with the NASUWT model policies and checklists.
The NASUWT is aware that both pay and appraisal policies have been imposed at Brook Weston Academies without trade union agreement.
BWT stated that policies were agreed by school staff committees three years ago, however such school based staff committees have no role in any aspect of collective bargaining regarding your terms and conditions of service.
Committee members are not democratically elected. The BWT pay and appraisal policies have ‘no limit’ on objectives, or ‘lesson observations’ while ‘teaching standards’ are used as a checklist in addition to any agreed objectives. The policies are workload intensive
NB: The Pay and Appraisal Policies in operation at BWT schools have not been agreed with education unions.
The NASUWT has reached agreement on the following two policies in the past two years;
- Maternity, Paternity, and Adoption Policy
- Overarching Health and Safety Policy.
NB: Agreement has not been reached with the NASUWT on any other policies.
Workplace Meetings
The NASUWT will arrange meetings with NASUWT members at your school in the forthcoming academic year on request. If you have any concerns either individually or collectively you should contact the NASUWT. If you do not have an NASUWT representative in your school contact your local, federation or negotiating secretary for advice or your NASUWT regional centre.
The NASUWT also has a new service called the Member Support Advice (MSA) Team that provides professional advice on telephone number 03330 145550. They will provide you with telephone numbers and which of the above would be your appropriate point of contact as well as providing instant advice.
As you will be aware the NASUWT is on national industrial action. The current imposed pay and appraisal policies breach the national industrial action instructions circulated to members. The NASUWT informed BWT that any imposed policies that did not conform to the joint pay policy and checklists on appraisal and lesson observations could lead to a collective dispute.
Protection of your pay and conditions under TUPE
Staff who transferred when the school became an academy transferred under TUPE and therefore benefit from the protections of TUPE. One of those protections is that changes to the transferred contract of employment cannot be made. Regulation 4(4) TUPE sets that out - any purported variation to the contract will be void. Therefore requiring staff that transferred under TUPE to sign new contracts is not permitted. The protection from TUPE does not apply only to certain terms and conditions. TUPE applies to the whole contract. The employer cannot pick and choose which bits of the contract are protected by TUPE - it is all protected by TUPE and so there should not be any move to introduce new contracts.
Employees therefore have the legal right to transfer to the new employer on their existing terms and conditions of employment and with all their existing employment rights and liabilities intact. Effectively, the new employer steps into the shoes of the old employer and it is as though the employee's contract of employment was always made with the new employer.
NB: Where an independent trade union had been recognised by the outgoing employer in respect of transferring employees, recognition will transfer to the incoming employer.
