NJC Pay update

Last week UNISON circulated a letter from the NJC Employers’ Side, which made an increased pay offer of 2.75%, along with one extra day of annual leave on the minimum, and a promise that they would approach government to ask for more money for local government pay. I also sent you the response from the NJC trade union executive.

 

UNISON have since received a further letter from the Employers, which is attached. This new letter makes it clear that in their view, this is a final pay offer, and they encourage us to begin consulting on it. They also state that they wish to begin to discussions about the impact of the increased National Living Wage from 2021, but they say they cannot do this until 2020-21 pay is settled.

 

NJC Executive members and officers have met and agreed to respond jointly with the other unions. The unions’ response is attached. We made clear that we do not consider the negotiations to be complete. At the time of writing, the Employers’ Side are still planning to write to the government asking for more money for local government pay. But they have not decided whether to agree to a joint process with the unions to take this forward, and they have not told us what they would be seeking from government.

 

Despite this, it is clear that negotiations are nearing their end, so, as per conference decisions, there needs to be a meeting of our NJC committee. Head office are exploring the best way, in these current times, to arrange such a meeting remotely so the committee can make decisions about how we take forward pay negotiations/consultation.