Monday 16 January 2017

Latest From Napo 133

Here's what I feel is most relevant from the latest Napo General Secretary's blog post:- 

ATTENDANCE MANAGEMENT SHAMBLES ALREADY A SOURCE OF GRIEF

As many of you will be aware, the new Civil Service Attendance Management Policy was implemented by NOMS into the NPS on 5th January 2017. It seems that the implementation of this policy, despite the failure to agree it with Napo and other unions, is set to cause huge rifts between managers and staff if the early feedback we have received this week is anything to go by.

The genesis of this deficient and divisive process is that the government sees public servants as a burden on society and has decided to launch one of the most punitive personnel management regimes for managing sick absence that it has been my misfortune to see in many years in this business.

We wrote out to NPS members in the week to confirm that we had received a number of queries and concerns from branches about this policy. Napo has followed up on the meeting that took place between Michael Spurr and the unions just before the Christmas break and are challenging both the contents and the implementation of the policy.

We have also made it clear to Michael Spurr and his senior management colleagues that we are appalled at the lack of clear communications to staff. Many managers have not received any information about what the policy contains and how it should be used, which has significantly hampered their ability to brief staff and local Napo reps. We also have serious doubts about the quality and quantity of the training that has been offered for managers. Below is the link to the advice Napo issued just before Christmas. We are working urgently on further guidance and advice for members which we will issue shortly.

Essentially, this policy was drawn up and implemented without anything resembling negotiation, and apart from some late and very cursory consultation where we managed to secure some changes, it was very much a case of ' carry on regardless' (for those of you who remember the lamentable series of movies of that genre) but without even the remotest semblance of humour.

While the NOMS supremos cannot escape the accusation that they have palpably failed to bat for their team, this is yet another example of the attitude that this government has for its employees who it sees as wasters and malingerers who jump at the opportunity to take sick leave. Unlike the faceless Mandarins in their Whitehall ivory towers who concocted this nonsense, our members live in the real world and we will do our best to highlight and challenge the numerous problems that this is already causing at all levels. Meanwhile, I fully appreciate the difficulties this implementation places on our reps on top of all the other pressures that you (and we) are facing, and Napo will do all that we can to help you represent any members who fall foul of the new instructions.

I aim to publish the exchanges we have had with Michael Spurr once he has been able to consider our latest letter, but issues such as the lack of an Equality Impact Assessment, retrospective treatment of absences preceding the policy, new rules on sick pay, and the way in which serious underlying medical conditions are apparently supposed to be totally ignored as a factor for not attending at work are right up there. So, as a member asked me yesterday, it's presumably ok for someone with an infectious medical condition to drag themselves into the office and put others at risk to avoid being pulled up under the policy?

More news as soon as we can get it to you.

30 comments:

  1. Colleagues attend work with infectious illnesses because they are terrified of losing their jobs. Obviously attending work impedes their recovery and others become ill.

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  2. When these policies were first introduced,we were told their purpose was to identify unusual sickness absence patterns and not to pursue those who had been genuinely ill. Now the policy is used to pursue and harass those who have been genuinely ill,while senior managers can rest assured in the knowledge that they can 'work from home'. It's heavy handed, discriminatory and serves only to cultivate a culture of mistrust and mutual resentment. Nice.

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  3. Another tightening of the screw, another example of employer power. Over the years I represented members subject to 'triggers' and 'stages'. The process was always adversarial; it was rare to come across a manager/overlooker who had actually read the policy; managers never seemed to get ill or trigger the policy; the treatment of workplace stress/ mental health issues was the dark ages revisited, there was breathtaking naivety about reasonable adjustments. As a management tool, to borrow a phrase, it was used as a hammer and every problem was treated as a nail


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    1. I am a JCC rep and attend monthly tele conferences. At no time were we advised of the policy or the withdrawal of
      NPS from nnc

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  4. Who manages the manager's sickness absence? Are they too under the same scrutiny?

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    1. In my experience, although subject to the policy, managers are treated differently. After all you cannot have your overlookers treated the same as the lower orders because they would experience the policy and practice as unfair and discriminatory and end up as less ruthless implementers.

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    2. So let me get this right,they are not subject to attendance management???? They can go off sick and its not recorded and counted the same way as us minions????

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    3. It's probably counted and recorded but less likely to trigger anything due to exercise of discretion. Management look after their own - it's part of the deal when the King's shilling is taken.

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  5. Yet another blindingly obvious inevitability of the MoJ/Noms approach to dismantling probation that the unions either ignored or colluded with & kept schtum about. At least CRC & NPS staff can now agree "we're all in it [i.e. the shit] together."

    (This may be a repeat as I think I broke the internet trying to post earlier).

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  6. Welcome to the new world order where right wing bullies rule unchallenged. Cameron & his ilk set the scene now May does what she likes, blames who she likes; Trump is simply appalling & appallingly simple; the mainstream media ridicule any form of alternative view as "not viable"; Gove, Johnson, *unt, etc etc - vile bodies the lot of them - dismantling the country to sell what remains as scrap to Russia & China. Sovereignty? Bollox! Its all about personal wealth, greed and envy. Just eight (8) individuals own much of the World's wealth. Leather trousers, celebrity pissups, jetting around the world... but if you're a worker bee with a crippling chest infection, you're sacked!

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    1. Oxfam today:

      "Eight MEN (my emphasis) own the same wealth as the 3.6 billion people who make up the poorest half of humanity, according to a new report published by Oxfam today to mark the annual meeting of political and business leaders in Davos.

      Oxfam’s report, ‘An economy for the 99 percent’, shows that the gap between rich and poor is far greater than had been feared. It details how big business and the super-rich are fuelling the inequality crisis by dodging taxes, driving down wages and using their power to influence politics. It calls for a fundamental change in the way we manage our economies so that they work for all people, and not just a fortunate few.

      New and better data on the distribution of global wealth – particularly in India and China – indicates that the poorest half of the world has less wealth than had been previously thought. Had this new data been available last year, it would have shown that nine billionaires owned the same wealth as the poorest half of the planet, and not 62, as Oxfam calculated at the time."

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    2. Reuters news agency:

      "While many workers struggle with stagnating incomes, the wealth of the super-rich has increased by an average of 11 percent a year since 2009.

      Bill Gates, the world's richest man who is a regular at Davos, has seen his fortune rise by 50 percent or $25 billion since announcing plans to leave Microsoft in 2006, despite his efforts to give much of it away.

      While Gates exemplifies how outsized wealth can be recycled to help the poor, Oxfam believes such "big philanthropy" does not address the fundamental problem.

      "If billionaires choose to give their money away then that is a good thing. But inequality matters and you cannot have a system where billionaires are systematically paying lower rates of tax than their secretary or cleaner," Max Lawson said.

      Oxfam bases its calculations on data from Swiss bank Credit Suisse and Forbes. The eight individuals named in the report are Gates, Inditex founder Amancio Ortega, veteran investor Warren Buffett, Mexico's Carlos Slim, Amazon boss Jeff Bezos, Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg, Oracle's Larry Ellison and former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg."

      Its beyond my imagination that someone's wealth could increase by $25Billion - one million times a PSO salary. And that's just the increase in value, not his total worth, "despite his efforts to give much of it away." ?!?!?!?!

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    3. On average each of these men has the same wealth as 450 million people.

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    4. 450 million people is roughly the combined populations of USA & Japan.

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    5. So while the UK government continues to trample the UK's workforce into the ground Gove can hardly contain himself whilst interviewing Trump, bowing (literally!) and scraping and grinning and lapping up The Donald's slop like a thirsty puppy. What is happening to the world?

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  7. It's now obvious the carbon units are nearing the end of their usefulness.

    They require constant maintenance and are often prone to complete shutdown . Some units also emit a constant whining noise.

    It's impossible to maximise profit with these variables.

    However the new silicon models show early promise . They seem well able to adapt to the new working model of twenty eight hours per day,nine day week.

    This will ensure the chosen eight can gain all of the wealth in all of the world.


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    1. But Silicon has a greater atomic number & mass, and its a metalloid. Beats Carbon hands-down every time even though they're both tetravalent.

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    2. It actually doesn't beat carbon hands down. The starfish is about as advanced a creature as you can have with silicon as it's base. Carbon is far more versatile and appropiate for life.

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  8. https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/2621402/offender-blags-beer-during-community-service/

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    1. "Probation bosses have launched a probe after an offender filled up a container with free beer during his COMMUNITY SERVICE – while his laughing supervisors looked on.

      Video footage shows the petty crook looking smug as the boss of a micro brewery fills an empty screen wash container with buckshee bitter from a barrel."

      So this is private enterprise?

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    2. Another crook can be heard shouting: “Twenty five litres of f***ing beer” as another jokes: “Plus screen wash.” And of the two community service supervisors watching on can be heard joining in the banter saying: “Lads working hard on CS (Community Service)” during the 32-second clip obtained by The Sun.

      The offender was then allowed to store the beer in one of the supervisors’ motors while he completed his community service sweeping the streets on the order of a court. The incident took place at Tweedale Court Industrial Estate in Madeley, Telford, Shrops.

      Four offenders supposedly being punished for their crimes had been taken to a unit used to store tools by a rehabilitation company before setting to work to tidy up roads in the area. But before their stint one of the men spotted that the unit next door was used by the local called Shires Brewery and asked a staff member there if he could buy a barrel “for a tenner.”

      The dray man told him he would give him free beer if he could find a container to put it in. The offender went off to search through the community service tool store and returned with a swilled out 25 litre screen wash plastic drum which was then filled with beer from a keg.

      The delighted crim – doing community service for driving offences – asked one of the supervisors if he could leave the booze in their Transit van. But he was told he could store it in the gaffers’ own personal van until the leaf clearing session was over.

      An eye-witness said:”The two supervisors just looked on as the bloke blagged a container of free beer during his community service. He then stowed it in one of the gaffer’s vans and carted it off when the gang came back from clearing up leaves in the area. I bet the magistrates who ordered him to do community service didn’t realise there was a free drink in it for him. The two blokes from the rehabilitation company didn’t bat an eye lid. It’s taking the Mickey out of the system really.”

      The CS stint was being run by the Warwickshire and West Mercia Community Rehabilitation Company. They run programmes when defendants are ordered to do community service work rather than serve prison sentences for their offences. A spokeswoman confirmed an investigation had been launched into the incident.

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    3. Dame Glenys seems to have missed that.

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    4. Shame it ended up in the media. It was harmless but not in the hands of moralisers.

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    5. Everyone's taking the initiative - free beer (probably out of date), use of screen wash tub, taking video, selling story to media, breaking news, slapping probation down...

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  9. http://m.stokesentinel.co.uk/inspectors-call-for-improvements-in-public-protection-work/story-30056300-detail/story.html

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  10. apologies for going off topic but I think that this is important. I get many campaign groups emailing me to sign a petition, mostly very good reasons. A few days ago I got one from Change.org which included Andrea Sharpe's letter to David Hood, a top dog in NOMS.

    Andrea is the mother of Tanis Bhandari who was murdered in Jan '15 in Plymouth. She is appealing to get the full details of the SFO report, activated because Donald Pemberton, the perpetrator, was under supervision by Devon and Cornwall CRC. She states that the enquiry was mis-managed. The CRC states that it is not obligatory to reveal details, as they are a private company, but the accuracy of this has been challenged.

    Over 4000 signatures have been gathered but they need 5000. You can access 2 blogs on this subject by scrolling down on the right hand side of this page, until you get to Blog Archive and scroll down January, until you get to bottom and 4th bottom of Jan - 'SFO- Lessons to Learn', and 'Petition Launched'. You can get the link to the Herald article at the end of the comments which has the link to the petition. Or - you can type -'Plymouth Herald - Family of murdered Tanis Bhandari launch petition' which takes you straight to the letter and the click on link.

    thanks.

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  11. I have never ever worked in such a sick office. Sick as in D and V, lung infections, flu (actual flu, and that was the boss) It is now clear that if you sneeze twice in a week you will be in improvement notice land forever and ever, so people incapable of making a good decision, but very able to pass on whichever lurgy they are hosting, are limping about the place. It's cruel, its inefficient, and its dangerous. About half of the team are incapable of making a sensible decision, two more are pregnant and heading for compulsive handwashing syndrome and musts be so anxious, and those of us still standing are just hacked off. This is no way to run anything. #omnishambles

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    1. Sounds delightfully Pythonesque: a building full of disease-ridden civil servants discharging piss, shit & snot, throwing the dead bodies into the street where the homeless rifle through their pockets before stealing their clothes.

      Still, if Trump, May & Gove get their way...

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  12. Divertimento - one of Trump's minions on C4 documentary tonight speaking about climate change. He was part of Trump's inner circle until Fter the ele tion and has now resumed lobbying for the fosil fuel industry. Not verbatim but to the effect that:

    "If you believe in it or not, we'll find out for sure who was right in fifty years' time."

    That perfectly encapsulates the selfish, myopic dystopian future we face courtesy of the fat orange bully and his lickspittle acolytes.

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  13. Sorry, but also off-topic, seems like the brakes are off as ministers go beserk making money. Hammond apparently invested heavily in a food tech company shortly before it landed massive government monies, and Jezza "NHS" *unt is rumoured to be pocketing some £15M+ following the sale of a business he was once involved in. So, clearly keeping their eyes utterly focused on their full time £150,000 a year plus considerable expenses cabinet jobs, no distractions whatsoever.

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