The Staff Side would like to ask the following question:
What is the timeframe for the Council to publish the findings of the recent Employment Tribunal and its proposed response to the findings?
Minutes:
The Director of HR suggested that this matter may be sub judice as there was a remedy hearing outstanding. It was the case that at the main tribunal hearing, LBB had been successful in 41 out of the 43 issues raised against the Council. The remedy hearing was to discuss the outstanding matters.
The Director of HR stated that there was nothing exceptional about the case that it should be published by the Council and it was LBB’s practice not to report on tribunal hearings—in any case the findings of the case had already been published by the Tribunal Service and the information was freely available on the internet. The Director informed the Committee that no recommendations for the Council had been issued by the Tribunal.
Ms Slater stated that the Council had been found wanting on two points during the course of the Tribunal hearing and on this basis the matter should be discussed at the LJCC. She expressed the view that the whole of the tribunal case revolved around the relationship between the Council and the union. Resultantly, there were still lessons that could be learnt, even from the rest of the hearing where the Council had not been found deficient.
The Director of HR responded that the tribunal hearing was not about LBB’s relationship with the unions, but it was an individual case. Such matters were not appropriate to be discussed at the LJCC. The Director offered to meet outside of the LJCC with Ms Slater if required.
Councillor Wilkins stated that she was a witness at the tribunal hearing. She felt that there were matters that had been discussed that were related to the LJCC, and that on that basis the matter should come back to the LJCC for further discussion. She asked if the date of the remedy hearing was known.
Councillor Nicholas Bennett commented that he had also been called to give evidence at the tribunal case, and noted that the resulting report had been published. He said that there had been three areas of remedy noted, and that two of these had been in relation to an individual requesting time off. The third matter was related to attending a conference connected to trade union activity, which was in turn subject to an ECJ ruling. He felt that in all of these cases, there were no lessons to be learnt by the Council that would justify the matter coming back to the LJCC. Councillor Simon Fawthrop agreed that there was no justification for the matter to be discussed at a future LJCC meeting. He cited the following reasons for this:
· The matter was sub-judice
· It was a case relating to an individual
· It was not a case related to the functioning of the LJCC
· The details had already been published
Ms Slater was disappointed that the majority of Members felt that there were no lessons to be learned. She felt that the LJCC was inextricably linked to the unions, which was a view that Members disagreed with. She felt that what was at stake were important issues concerning how the Council related to the unions.
Councillor Carr remarked that in his view the unions did not want to consult and negotiate with the Council. He would have preferred if they would sit down and take the opportunity to do so. Ms Slater responded that there were areas highlighted in the Tribunal case where the Council had crossed a line and that there were lessons that could be learnt.
Councillor Bennett motioned that the request for the matter to be discussed at a future meeting of the LJCC be dismissed for the reasons that had already been outlined in the meeting. The motion was seconded by the Leader. So it was resolved that the matter would not be brought back to a future LJCC meeting. Councillor Angela Wilkins did not agree with the motion or the resolution.
RESOLVED that the issue of the findings of the recent tribunal case was not an appropriate matter to be brought back to a future LJCC meeting for reasons discussed in the meeting.