Friday, 2 October 2020

Where's The Money?

From a contributor yesterday:-

"Another pay day has come and gone bringing with it the by now usual anger and bitterness towards our NPS employers and the so called trade unions. By my reckoning I am now owed £1973.60 in back pay. This comprises of £236 per month in unpaid incremental progression and £92.93 per month in an unpaid cost of living rise which, I believe should be 3% this year both to recognise our work through the pandemic and bring us into line with other Civil Service pay awards. I need this money now please. 

At least our employers appear to be doing something. Amy Rees advised three weeks ago that she had submitted a business case to the Cabinet Office and the Treasury asking to be allowed to negotiate an above inflation cost of living rise and to pay the one more year of automatic incremental progression implicitly promised in the 2018 to 2020 pay deal. Another very reliable source confirmed this week that the business case has been approved so negotiations can go ahead. 

Unless I'm missing something there is still a stony silence from NAPO and UNISON. When will they announce the urgent resumption of pay talks? When will the ballot go out to their predominantly supine memberships to ask for approval of a deal they will inevitably attempt to take the credit for? Will we, as usual, hear the advice that it's the best we could get so you'd better vote for it or you'll get nothing? 

Amy Rees expressed an ambition to restructure pay again next year. Presumably this is for the absorption of our CRC colleagues into NPS. I hope and expect that her goal is to make sure that everyone moves over on the same T&C's we "enjoy" in NPS. Finally, Amy Rees also reported that she would like to be able to see the award including incremental progression in our October pay packets. With 30 days to go the clock is ticking. Get a bloody move on."

--oo00oo--

"Yes why are there so little posts on this pay issue? Do people not care or are some of them of the view that at least we have a job? Well no concessions are made for covid in terms of the expectations on us so where is our pay and how is this stall allowed? Unions do your job as has been said or are you only bothered about your own salary and not upsetting our bosses."

From Twitter:-

"There was #Hiddenheroesday a couple of days ago, didn’t hear pay being mentioned then?"

"You mean a well done isn't enough? I'm thinking of using my thanks email to pay my rent."

15 comments:

  1. Mornin'

    "The Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (IPSA) has announced that basic pay for UK members of parliament (MPs) will increase by 3.1% from 1 April 2020.

    Announced yesterday (5 April 2020), this brings MPs’ overall salary from £79,468 to £81,932. This pay increase is in line with the decision by IPSA in 2015 to adjust MPs’ pay at the same rate as changes to public sector earnings, which was confirmed in July 2018 following on from further reviews into the pay of MPs."

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Factcheck: "MPs’ wages have risen faster than the starting salaries for these other public sector professions (police, nurses, teachers).

      Arguably what’s more important is looking at how far salaries go, by comparing them to the change in prices over time – inflation. While MPs have seen their salaries rise slightly faster than inflation, the other three professions’ starting salaries have not. That means that their pay packets go less far in 2020 than they did in 2010."

      The piece shows how police starting salary has fallen in 'real terms' by 14% over the ten year period.

      Delete
    2. https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/62379/special-advisers-in-post-28-october.pdf

      PMs adviser Andy Coulson was on £140k in 2010 ...

      Delete
    3. ... https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/854554/Annual_Report_on_Special_Advisers.pdf

      Now there are many more SpAds, with at least seven on salaries in excess of £100k.

      The extent of consultant fees was highlighted earlier this week - £1.5billion a year & counting.

      The cost of private contracts/outsourcing won't be known until mid-2021 because this govt won't release the figures, but it will be £hundreds-of-billions. Very little, if any, will find its way into employee pay packets. Shareholders & directors will tidy up first.

      Probation staff are so far down the pecking order its a wonder they still exist. In fact, by the end of 2021 they WON'T exist... they'll be civil servants, custody staff, responsible officers, etc.

      Delete
    4. What was a qualified PO starting salary in 2010?

      What is it now?

      Where will it be in 2022 after alignment with civil service pay structures?

      Delete
  2. Trump positive for covid-19 - is it another of his chaos strategies? A ploy to delay the election? Is there a god after all? Will the Bigoted Orange Tumour succumb? Will probation staff be paid? Who has more clout with the Treasury - Amy Rees or Ian Lawrence?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hahaha Ian Lawrence and clout the man is is cowardly player of appeasement. Needs legal advice before making himself a drink. Napo are frozen until a new lead actually restarts the association. Clout you mean clot.

      Delete
  3. Amy Rees gets over £130k a year plus bonuses. Like she gives a Tom-tit.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Nationally there's a shortage of testing, a massive backlog of tests & lab time, delays in analysis, people waiting up to a week (or more) for results.

    As posted last night I observed a testing station which seemed more or less empty of 'customers' for much of the day; the testing staff said to me "as you can see we're not exactly overwhelmed" with work (while grinning).

    I was tested at noon yesterday. I registered my test online (after a struggle with the system) just before 10pm. My test result arrived an hour later, at 11pm last night.

    So what the fuck is going wrong? Why is it such a calamitous mess? Why are there testing sites more or less empty for days at a time when those tests should be utilised in fighting the virus? How much time & money is being wasted - as with the test/trace staff - on paying people to do nothing?

    I have argued long & hard that these tasks should have been delegated to local public health teams who know what they're doing. Rather than hand vast sums of public money to private companies, local public health professionals should have been properly funded to do the job they know & understand. Many of them, as already written here previously, are having to clear up the shitty mess that the private companies leave behind.

    But no, just as with the probation fiasco Bozo & Wancock decide to give £billions to their consultant & global facilities chums.

    Its criminal, its dangerous & its shameful that we let them get away with it.


    The test was Negative.

    FranK.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Another 7,000 new cases today out of 260,000 tests, with 66 deaths reported per the govt's terms & conditions of dying from covid-19. Other means of dying are available.

      FranK.

      Delete
  5. Inmates at a prison in Nottinghamshire are being held in their cells for all but 30 minutes a day as the number of coronavirus cases there rises to 84.

    Nottinghamshire's public health director Jonathan Gribbin said prisoners at HMP Lowdham Grange have all been issued face masks and mobile testing units are on site.

    With 63 prisoners and 21 staff members testing positive, Gribbin added that workers could also be contributing to an increase in cases in other parts of the county.

    "We have seen rates in Newark and Sherwood have surged over the last 10 days or so," he said. "The situation in Lowdham Grange prison is a significant driver of those rates locally."

    Prison director Mark Hanson said he was working with Public Health England, the NHS and the council "to look after everyone in the prison and we are taking every measure possible to keep them safe, maintain their mental wellbeing and combat the virus".

    BBC news

    ReplyDelete
  6. Where's the money gone? Let's look at the annual accounts...

    https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/921407/HMPPS_Annual_Report_and_Accounts_2019-20.pdf

    Agency staff £54m
    departures/severance £10m
    CRCs £400m
    Tagging £71m
    special payments to staff £10m
    special payments to offenders £16m
    15 senior civil servants earning in excess of £100,000
    Farrar - £155/160K
    Copple - £150/155K
    Rees - £130/135K
    McEwen - £110/115K
    Adam - £110/115K
    Swidenbank - £115/120K
    Scott - £120/125K
    Blakeman - £110/115K

    All but Farrar pocketed bonuses of between £10,000 & £15,000 plus very generous pension top-ups (over £100K for Rees).

    "Bonuses are based on performance levels attained and are made as part of the appraisal process. Bonus payments made in 2019–20 are for bonuses awarded in 2018–19."

    ReplyDelete
  7. “15 senior civil servants in HMPPS earning in excess of £100,000
    Farrar - £155/160K
    Copple - £150/155K
    Rees - £130/135K
    McEwen - £110/115K
    Adam - £110/115K
    Swidenbank - £115/120K
    Scott - £120/125K
    Blakeman - £110/115K

    All but Farrar pocketed bonuses of between £10,000 & £15,000 plus very generous pension top-ups (over £100K for Rees)”. I’d like to know what NPS Directors are earning, and what bonuses they’ve been receiving during COVID. I reckon it’s a lot more than the £1500 monthly bonuses Heads of Service have been receiving.

    This is disgusting, when the HMPPS / NPS probation staff lower down the pecking order are waiting months for a less than adequate increment pay rise that still hasn’t been paid. Forced to work through the pandemic in NPS offices for a pesky £150 bonus that many didn’t get and has now ceased.

    As the Guest Blogger said earlier in the week, we’re all #HiddenHeroes, but their thanks won’t pay the bills.

    http://probationmatters.blogspot.com/2020/09/guest-blog-79.html?m=1

    ReplyDelete
  8. Straying slightly, but I note that Social Workers have been awarded a 2.75% payrise this year. The Unions were asking for a 10% rise.
    However, at the same time Social Work is facing its own form of TR with regard to it children services. I find it gravely disturbing that the government intend to delegate children services to third parties, basically creating a supply chain of children to the private sector via outsourcing.
    G4s child protection services?
    I find it very chilling!

    https://www.jfhc.co.uk/is-it-right-to-delegate-local-authority-childrens-social-care-functions-adcs-response

    'Getafix

    ReplyDelete
  9. The whole episode regarding pay is a monumental screw over by all sides and I never understood why it was not spotted when they put the 'offer' on the table. I do not expect fuck all anytime soon!

    ReplyDelete