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A barrier to overcome

13 August 2009

Facility time is an issue for those interested in getting involved with the young members' network. Lincolnshire convenor Nick Parker explains why he's found it difficult to take part in activity.

A stressful job in itself, I work in a Jobcentre Plus contact centre. I’m a union rep and have an allocation of 12 days a year for union business.

This may seem generous, but when you represent over a hundred members, it is difficult to manage your time with all the assistance demanded by the role.

A busy role

I represent members in disciplinary hearings, have monthly informal meetings with contact centre managers, participate in various campaigns and attempt to organise periodic workplace meetings.

I’m also branch young members’ (YM) officer and Lincs YM convenor.

The guidance received from the network means I should be a contact for young members; encouraging participation, representing views, convening local meetings and events, distributing relevant information, producing branch newsletters, campaigning on young members’ issues, participating in training, mapping my workplace and reporting back to young members.

I write about this to identify a problem and seek a solution. Young members’ officers and regional convenors attract no facility time.

This is a barrier to union participation. How can the young members’ network be representative if only those who are able to take part fully are privy to less restrictive environments?

Young members' drive

Perversely, areas like call centres have a higher proportion of young members but can often be discouraged from playing a full part in union activity.

This is not just a bureaucratic problem. Encouraging the participation of young members in call centres is linked to resisting attacks on our members in this arena.

Attacks like excessive monitoring, lack of flexible working, poor health and safety, and bullying management can only be driven back by an active union membership led by young members.

I was pleased to see this years’ national conference agree to campaign for a call centre framework agreement across the civil service.

Let’s hope we can also encourage management to look again at agreements and obtain full rights and facilities for young activists in PCS.

There are over 300 bargaining areas with individual facilities agreements in existence across the civil service and privatised areas we represent.

While our demand for national framework agreements on issues such as facility time is still ongoing, your national executive committee is aspiring to achieve fair and transparent facilities agreements, including for young member reps, with our employers across the board.

In the meantime, some guidance on facility time:

  • Health & safety and learning representatives are entitled to reasonable time off to perform their duties by law. Further guidance can be found on teh Acas website. 
  • Facility time allocations are usually covered within union recognition agreements. Ask your branch secretary for more details on this.
  • Most civil service departments will have facility time guidance listed on their internal intranet sites.
  • Some groups in PCS have obtained limited facility time for young member reps, for example, in the HMRC facility time for young members is agreed to carry out equalities duties. You should contact your group secretary to find out what the arrangements are in your area.
  • Where issues arise regarding facility time, we would encourage branches to take a pro-active and inclusive approach to young members and seek where possible to obtain facilities time. You should speak to your local rep or branch secretary for more information.

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