Shrops Council entire staff sacked! 6500 employees.

[hornetrider]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/jul/05/shro...

With a promise to rehire tham with a 5.4% cut

Now, I'm all for public sector spending cuts (we have no money etc) but this is pretty extreme. Is it even legal?

[Defcon5]

Wouldnt they have had to pay them all redundancy money?

[Mojooo]

They are not the only council to be doing this.

I believe the Fire Service tried to do this and got strikes.............. ?

[DocJock]

IANAL, but if they make them redundant they can't re-employ them doing the same jobs.

I'm also pretty sure that if I said I was dismissing someone without good reason I'd be at an IT before I could blink.

[davepoth]

It really does depend on what their contract says - but it does sound a bit dodgy.

[Tsippy]

The Guardian - the left wing version of the Daily Mail, I'd take what they claim with caution, the paper exists purely to anger their readership.

[remedy]

DocJock said:

IANAL, but if they make them redundant they can't re-employ them doing the same jobs.

I'm also pretty sure that if I said I was dismissing someone without good reason I'd be at an IT before I could blink.

The link says the unions woouldn't accept the previous terms so this was the last resort.

Seems fair to me.

[MOTORVATOR]

Absolutely legitimate.

Unilateral so no discrimatory or unfair action is taking place.

Other avenues explored? No need - Redundancy would be discrimatory and more damaging to some employees than this process so test proven.

They will not have sacked them they will simply have terminated the existing contracts of employment with the relevant notice periods for those who do not sign up to the new contracts.

Those signing immediately to the new contracts will waive the notice period and the employment will count as continuous service for all intents.

Those not doing so will no longer treated as continous service even if they sign up later. (I have no doubt that may be waived)

Proven need to reduce employment costs? Well their budget is dictated, they cannot just invent revenue streams to offset it.

They are doing what any prudent private sector company director would do in the circumstances, indeed the majority working in the construction industry will have either experienced or been affected by exactly this circumstance in the last five years.

I would go so far to say that local authorities that do not take this course of action and struggle meeting their targets deserve to be dealt with quite firmly.

[ninja-lewis]

DocJock said:

IANAL, but if they make them redundant they can't re-employ them doing the same jobs.

I'm also pretty sure that if I said I was dismissing someone without good reason I'd be at an IT before I could blink.

It's not redundancy. Employment law includes "Some Other Substantial Reason" alongside the better known forms of fair dismissal - conduct, capability, retirement, redundancy, statutory requirement.

"Some Other Substantial Reason" covers things like imprisonment, personality clashes, at the behest of a third party, breakdown of trust and confidence and business need. In particular it allows an employer to dismiss employees if they refuse to accept changes to terms and conditions that are in the interest's of the business - e.g. as part of a reorganisation to meet changing customer demand.

The employer still has to follow normal dismissal procedure, including issuing 90 days notice (for 100+ employees) during which they must consult the workforce. At the end of the 90 day period, the existing contract is terminated and a new one issued. It can be explicitly accepted in writing or implicitly by continuing to turn up to work.

Dismissal and re-engagement is effectively what happens whenever terms and conditions are changed; the contract itself can't be changed, so a new one replaces it instead.

[MX7]

Average pay gap between public-private sectors 'widens'

It can't be ignored.

[172ff]

Defcon5 said:

Wouldnt they have had to pay them all redundancy money?

Old news.... The LA I work for did this back in April. Re your question - They paid me the difference of the reduction for the length of my notice period i.e. 3 months at what my salary would have been without a reduction less rate less the reduced rate. Now I'm paid on the reduced rate.

[Pesty]

hornetrider said:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2011/jul/05/shro...

With a promise to rehire tham with a 5.4% cut

Now, I'm all for public sector spending cuts (we have no money etc) but this is pretty extreme. Is it even legal?

I'm not saying its right or wrong but does anybody here think this wont affect the way they work?

How many extra tea breaks are they going to take they will be so creative taking the piss it will be unreal.

I know if my employer did this to me my motivation would become zero. Thats just Human nature

[Mojooo]

Very bad idea from an employee relations point of view.

They would have been better of just making 400 people redundant over a slower period of time and/or cutting services.

[Deva Link]

I don't know why most of them couldn't just be replaced by unpaid volunteers.

[NorthernBoy]

Pesty said:

I'm not saying its right or wrong but does anybody here think this wont affect the way they work?

How many extra tea breaks are they going to take they will be so creative taking the piss it will be unreal.

I know if my employer did this to me my motivation would become zero. Thats just Human nature

It's not universal human nature, though, just because it might be yours. If my employer showed that revenues were down, and that meant that I'd need to take a cut, then why would I want to make things worse by reducing efficiency?

[Gargamel]

Does Shropshire need 6500 people to run the services.

I wonder how many people shropshire cc employed in say 1980 ? Given the efficiencies of computers and databases since then, you'd expect the 1980 number to have fallen right ?

Anyone have a guess ?

[Mojooo]

Gargamel said:

Does Shropshire need 6500 people to run the services.

I wonder how many people shropshire cc employed in say 1980 ? Given the efficiencies of computers and databases since then, you'd expect the 1980 number to have fallen right ?

Anyone have a guess ?

Well they had a population increase of more than 35,000 between 1981 and 2007. And many services require that old thing called a human. I would also imagine many extra services exist that didnt back then


I imagine computers only ADD to the number of people that are needed! IT support, web people, security people, software consultants.

[Pesty]

NorthernBoy said:

It's not universal human nature, though, just because it might be yours. If my employer showed that revenues were down, and that meant that I'd need to take a cut, then why would I want to make things worse by reducing efficiency?

If you belive they would be able to work exactky the same because they have seen the bigger picture I'd like a pair of your tinted glasses please.

I just can't see it happening.

[theboss]

As a Shropshire resident I'd be far happier if they didn't re-hire at least half of them. What a waste of fking space.

Pesty said:

I'm not saying its right or wrong but does anybody here think this wont affect the way they work?

How many extra tea breaks are they going to take they will be so creative taking the piss it will be unreal.

I know if my employer did this to me my motivation would become zero. Thats just Human nature

How many extra tea breaks can a council worker actually take? Worse still, loads of them might just go on 6-month periods of sick leave due to the overwhelming stress of the situation... hang on a minute...

Edited by theboss on Tuesday 5th July 20:49

[NorthernBoy]

Pesty said:

If you belive they would be able to work exactky the same because they have seen the bigger picture I'd like a pair of your tinted glasses please.

I just can't see it happening.

You may well be right, I'm just saying that not everyone will act that way.