Council staff face changes to contracts in cost-cutting move

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Thousands of staff at Hammersmith and Fulham Council affected

Hammersmith and Fulham Council has told council staff that they must accept changes to their contracts which mean cuts to paid maternity leave, less time off for caring or family responsiblities, restrictions to flexi-time and less pay for working on Saturdays.

Those who refuse to accept the new conditions will not be able to continue working at Hammersmith and Fulham Council.

The changes to contracts will apply to all council staff who are not teachers or senior management.

A redundancy notice, known as an HR1 document, has been served to all 4,200 staff at the council, but this does not mean that anyone will be made redundant.

However, those who refuse to sign the new contracts will no longer be allowed to carry on working at the local authority.

The changes include:

 

• Increasing the number of days in a working week from five to seven, with no extra pay for evenings and weekends
• Increasing core hours of work in the 36-hour flexi-time week, meaning employees will have to work between 10am and 4pm, instead of between 11am and 2pm.
• Slashing maternity leave from 16 weeks full pay to just six weeks in addition to statutory maternity leave.
• Cutting dependency, compassionate or bereavement leave.

The changes to conditions are expected to slash costs at the council, which has pledged to reduce council tax for the third year in a row.

A blogger on HF Conwatch, a website critical of Hammersmith and Fulham's Conservative-run council, said: "What are the 'service-critical savings' to be gained by preventing staff flexing out sometimes at 3pm to pick up kids from schools that generally (including in H&F) end the day at 3.30 pm? Or cutting maternity leave in half (or more)? Or reducing carers' leave to 15 hours a year?"

A spokeswoman for Hammersmith and Fulham Council said: "The main aims of reviewing terms and conditions are to reduce costs, improve service delivery, and bring the Council’s terms and conditions in line with other councils and similar organisations.

"As part of our commitment to becoming an employer of choice, already much change is happening to improve our business focus and the development of staff.

"In return, we are raising our expectations of staff – by working with them to embed a culture of continuously improving performance with high attendance at work that will deliver even better services to our residents."

 

October 22, 2008