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Flexible Working Arrangements
Tackling Britain’s long-hours culture and getting a better balance between work
and the rest of life has moved high up the trade union agenda in recent years.
The number of people working long hours in Britain has risen to over four
million in the past 10 years despite legislation aimed at curbing excessive
hours working. Long hours are linked to ill health, stress and low productivity.
And it’s not surprising. The number of people working long hours in Britain has
risen to over four million in the past 10 years despite legislation aimed at
curbing excessive hours working. Long hours are linked to ill health, stress and
low productivity. The long hours culture is one of the major barriers to women’s
advancement. Long hours and inflexible working patterns also contribute to the
stress of combining work and home life. Workers with dependants, in particular,
are increasingly demanding working hours and patterns that are compatible with
their caring and family commitments.
But research suggests that only around half of employees currently have the
opportunity of any type of flexible working arrangement. Only a third have
access to a flexitime scheme and less than a fifth have the option to job-share.
Tackling long hours, along with developing new flexible patterns of work are
therefore key trade union bargaining issues.
Of course employers often have their own agenda on flexibility which has nothing
to do with the interests of the workforce. Flexibility for bad employers simply
means workers making whatever accommodations are necessary to fulfil the needs
of the organisation.
But increasingly, some employers are recognising that flexible working
arrangements that satisfy the needs and aspirations of their employees can also
benefit the organisation. Employees who feel better able to balance work with
the rest of their lives are likely to be more highly motivated. Improved staff
morale, lower rates of sickness absence, a lower turnover of staff, increased
productivity and better service delivery are just some of the benefits of
flexible working reported by employers.
Where flexible working arrangements are being developed, UNISON needs to be
centrally involved in the whole process. Schemes that are developed jointly are
far more likely to produce the mutual benefits that flexible working can provide
for both the workforce and service delivery.
Flexible working policies and procedures need to be clear, understood by all
staff and equitably applied. Managers need to be trained and implementation
needs to be monitored. Entitlements, procedures and rights of appeal need to be
clearly set out.
Staff involvement is key to the success of flexible working practices. Some of
the most innovative work-life balance initiatives have taken a bottom up
approach with the needs of each service and the staff within it considered
uniquely. Staff and unions have been fully involved in developing new ways of
working that prioritise service delivery whilst accommodating the interests of
the staff who work in the service.
The law and health and safety
Employers have a legal responsibility to consider requests for flexible working.
From April 2003, a new duty was set out in the Employment Bill, which requires
employers to "seriously consider" requests for changes to working patterns from
employees with six months service who have children under the age of six, or
disabled children under the age of 18. Employers will have to respond to such
requests within two weeks and provide an explanation if the request is denied.
Parents also have the right to appeal and are protected from dismissal or
detriment for making the request.
This legal right was part of the Government’s package of measures to encourage
"family friendly" employment practices. The package included rights which came
into force in December 1999 to take time off work to deal with an emergency
involving a dependant (time off for dependants) and for parents to take leave to
care for their children (parental leave). A number of the agreements highlighted
below make reference to arrangements for special leave for family/domestic
reasons which improve upon the statutory entitlements.
It is important to ensure that any flexible working policies and arrangements
fully take account of employees’ legal rights under other legislation. For
example, the Working Time Regulations lay down the law on working hours,
holidays and rest breaks. Under the Disability Discrimination Act, an employer
who fails to make "reasonable adjustments" (which may include adjustments to
working hours) may be deemed guilty of discrimination against a disabled
employee. And under the Part-Time Workers Regulations and other legislation,
part timers must not be treated less favourably than comparable full timers.
Under the Health and Safety at Work Act, employers have a duty to protect the
health, safety, and welfare of their employees, including those who work on
flexible schemes, such as home workers. Where employees are working outside of
the traditional working hours, their health and safety needs must not be
overlooked. Any risk assessments carried out must take account of these staff
and preventative measures devised and put in place to protect them. Examples of
the type of risk staff may face include working alone; the possibility of a
violent incident occurring, and the need to travel late at night or early
mornings – a concern that may be relevant for both male and female staff. It is
also important to ensure that staff on flexible hours are not overlooked when
training needs are assessed and training offered. This is particularly important
where training directly relates to health and safety, for example fire drills.
Flexible Working:
Variety of arrangements
No two members of staff will ever have exactly the same needs. The greater the
variety of flexible working arrangements that an organisation can reasonably
offer, the greater the appeal it will have as an employer to the widest numbers
of staff.
Flexitime
Traditionally flexi-schemes have involved employees working core set hours each
working day and working the remainder of their hours at their discretion within
the flexi-hours limit. Hours are reconciled over an agreed period, often a
month. Flexi-schemes have tended to be applied uniformly throughout the
organisation. However, some newer flexi-schemes are moving away from this rigid
corporate approach to localised schemes, developed with the participation of
staff and unions, and appropriate to each department or service. Core hours are
being reduced or replaced by other methods which ensure the necessary level of
cover is provided.
TOIL and Time Accounts
Time off in lieu (TOIL) arrangements enable staff to claim back time off for the
extra hours they may need to work during busy periods or outside normal hours.
In some TOIL schemes staff are obliged to claim back the hours within a
specified time frame and UNISON negotiators will want to ensure any restrictions
of this sort are not unreasonable. In time accounts, additional hours worked are
"banked" for the future and may give flexibility for staff to take the hours at
times which particularly suit them eg during school holidays. Again it will be
important to ensure that schemes do not conflict with the requirements of the
Working Time Regulations.
Compressed working
This enables employees to work their normal hours over fewer days, providing
more half or full days away from work without reducing pay. These schemes often
prove highly popular with staff. At Pendle Borough Council, management and
unions negotiated a Work Life Balance Agreement which included provision for
full time staff to have the option of working a four-day week or nine-day
fortnight.
Self rostering
These schemes involve staff organising shifts on a departmental or team basis,
subject to the exigencies of the service, and are increasingly being developed
in parts of the public services. Often the lack of control over working hours
experienced by shiftworkers has proved an insurmountable barrier to employees
attempting to combine work with their caring and home responsibilities. This is
particularly true for services which employ a large proportion of women such as
nursing. Self rostering can help staff balance their work and home commitments
and help recruitment and retention in services which have found it difficult to
attract and keep sufficient numbers of staff.
V-time working
Voluntary reduced hours ("V" time) enables employees to voluntarily reduce their
working hours for an agreed period. It may be for any number of reasons, for
example: to enable an employee to settle a child into school or an older
relative into a care home; or to undertake a course of study or study for exams.
Staff and unions will need to take into account the potential impact on staff
benefits, such as pensions.
Some advice on:
Part-time work and reduced working hours
Job-sharing
Term-time working
Flexitime
Compressed working week
Annual hours
Self-rostering
Part-time working and
reduced hours
Part-time work is by far the most common way of balancing work and family
commitments.
The Labour Research Department (LRD) survey of UNISON branches found part-time
work to be the most commonly available form of flexible working arrangement,
with 94% of respondents saying that it was available to all or some staff at
their workplace. In many cases availability was subject to the needs of the
organisation, but many employers had a policy of favourably considering requests
to work part time.
Switching to and from part-time work
Regulations from April 2003, gave parents of children up to age six the right to
request to work flexibly or reduce their hours, and have their requests
considered seriously by their employer.
The regulations provide a right to request a permanent change to working hours
or working arrangements. However some employers already have arrangements in
place that allow, or encourage consideration of, requests to work part-time
either as a permanent or temporary change. In some cases this arrangement is
part of a maternity policy and is limited to women returning to work after
maternity leave.
The benefits of the voluntary reduced hours scheme are listed as allowing:
employees more time for personal commitments, for example, caring for children,
elderly relatives or health reasons;
employees who can no longer work full time to continue in employment;
the reduction of hours for employees who do not wish to or who cannot afford to
reduce their hours substantially, eg by job-sharing; and
the option of reducing hours on a temporary basis, with the security of being
able to revert back to full time at the end of the agreed period.
It should be remembered that reductions in working hours will be accompanied by
an equivalent loss of holiday entitlement, and could also affect other benefits
such as pensions. The TUC Changing Times guide describes a scheme at J
Sainsbury, called the Personal Retirement Plan, that allows older workers the
chance to reduce their working hours and draw partially on their company pension
scheme in order not to reduce their salary.
Job sharing
Job sharing is where two individuals share a full-time post, although they may
not both do an equal number of hours. One of the advantages for employees over
part-time work is that pay and benefits are pro-rata to the full-time post.
Nine out of ten employers in the UNISON branch survey offered job sharing to at
least some staff.
Job sharing helps to;
assist in the recruitment of staff;
deploy staff in the most effective manner;
retain staff who would otherwise leave the organisation, thereby maintaining
skill levels;
allow employees access to more senior posts, which may not be available on a
part-time basis;
provide an environment which supports flexible working arrangements; and
allows information and guidance to be available at the outset to facilitate the
effective operation of job share, which brings benefits to the organisation and
allows individuals to feel valued.
If one of the job shares leaves, it is important to ensure that the other job
sharer has job security. For this reason each of the postholders should be
employed under an individual and not a joint contract of employment. The
remaining post holder should also be given the option to take up the full-time
post if the other person leaves.
Term-time working
Term-time working, in which staff do not work during school holidays, can be a
useful option for parents of school-age children. On the other hand there are
many UNISON members working in schools, in particular classroom assistants and
schools meals staff, who work during the term time because that is what is
available, and who may wish to work longer hours. They are also excluded from
claiming state benefits during holidays, even though they are not paid.
Therefore, the advice below needs to be read in the context of the important
concerns UNISON holds in relation to how term-time operates in many workplaces
(link to term-time working campaign).
Women are far more likely to work during term times only (8.2%) than men (1.5%),
according to the Labour Force Survey in spring 2002. Around 28% of women would
like to work during term-times only, according to the Work-life balance 2000:
Baseline study, and 22% of men expressed an interest in this working pattern.
The LRD survey
of UNISON branches found that 48% of employers offered term-time working to some
staff, with around half of these being local authorities that employ education
support staff. Some health trusts also offer this working pattern to nurses.
UNISON's
Bargaining Support guide to flexible working advises that good schemes allow
term-time workers' pay to be spread out throughout the year, and not just during
term time, which also has the advantage of establishing their rights as
permanent employees. This avoids the risk that term-time workers might not be
recognised as having continuous employment by Employment Tribunals.
Normally workers will take both their paid annual leave, together with unpaid
leave, in the school holidays. But guidelines from the GMB general union
recommend that where possible term-time workers should have the option of up to
three days annual leave per term.
At the Department for Education and Skills (DfES) term-time working is an
example of part-year working, which allows staff to work less than 52 weeks a
year. It can be beneficial to carers of elderly people, as well as parents. The
DfES also permits the option of working full time during term times and part
time during the school holidays.
Flexitime
Flexitime is the most commonly used form of flexible working after part-time
working, used by 24% of employees in the Work-life balance 2000: Baseline study.
It is also commonly available among employers of UNISON members, at 86% of
workplaces in the LRD branch survey. It was most prevalent in local authorities,
where 92% have a flexitime scheme, compared to 80% of health service employers.
Flexitime was the third most commonly available form of flexible working
arrangement in the survey, after part time and job share.
Flexitime allows workers to vary their start and finish times. Schemes are
normally characterised by the following rules:
core hours during which staff must be at work, for example between 10am to 12am
and 2pm to 4pm;
an earliest start and latest finish time, for example 8am to 6pm (the limits the
working day are sometimes known as bandwidth);
a settlement or accounting period for calculating hours in credit or debit,
commonly four weeks;
a limit on the number of hours that can be carried over. In some schemes, having
more debit hours than permitted (say 10 hours) could result in disciplinary
procedures being used;
a system for recording hours or clocking in and out; and
some schemes impose limits on the number of days flexi-leave that can be taken
one settlement period (commonly one or two).
Some recent work-life balance initiatives have focused on extending the existing
flexitime scheme to give employees greater control over their working hours. At
Bolton Metro council the working day was lengthened from 7am to 7pm, with an
increase in the number of days that can be taken off each month to two. And at
Aberdeenshire Council the working day was temporarily extended to 7.30 am to
6.30 pm to help staff avoid problems caused by local traffic restrictions.
Flexitime schemes should be available equally to part-time employees and to all
grades of staff. Guidance produced by the National Joint Council for Local
Government Services, Finding the balance, advises local authorities to "consider
why flexitime has tended to be unavailable to part-time and front line
employees". While there may sometimes be operational reasons, it could simply be
a legacy of different approaches to former APT&C and manual employees.
Some respondents to the LRD/UNISON survey of branches mentioned the difficulty
of including shiftworkers in the flexitime scheme. However these difficulties
may not be insurmountable, and Wiltshire Police, for example, is specifically
including shiftworkers in the flexible working practices.
One of the objections that employers may raise about introducing flexitime is
that of providing cover for absent staff. Listawood, a firm making mouse mats in
Norfolk, has resolved this problem by introducing a "buddy system" that twins
people so that a person is not off at the same time as their buddy.
Compressed working week
A small proportion of employees work a compressed working week, where weekly
hours are worked over a shorter period, for example a four or four and a
half-day week or a nine-day fortnight. Only 6% of employees in the Work-life
balance 2000: Baseline study work a compressed week, and a mere 1.6% according
to the Labour Force Survey for Spring 2002.
But compressed hours was the form of flexible work most in demand after
flexitime, according to the Baseline study, with 40% of male employees and 30%
of female respondents wanting to work in this way. Only 15% of UNISON branches
in the LRD/UNISON survey said that compressed working was available where they
worked.
This form of working is often popular with employees who wish to have more days
away from work without loss of pay. On the negative side, longer days can be
more stressful for some employees and could affect performance. The National
Joint Council for Local Government Services guide Finding the balance advises
that "evaluation mechanisms need to be in place to check whether anticipated
benefits for employees and services are actually happening".
Annual hours
According to the definition used in the Labour Force Survey, around 4% of
employees work on annualised hours contracts, in which hours are not calculated
on a weekly basis, but over a year. Actual hours worked in a given day or week
may vary provided that the annual total meets the contractual requirement.
The Work-life balance 2000: Baseline study shows a demand for annualised hours
from 21% of employees surveyed (24% of men and 18% of women).
The LRD survey of UNISON branches found that 35% of employers have some staff
working on annual hours contracts. These tend to be security staff or parks and
gardens staff in local authorities.
Annualised hours contracts have sometimes been resisted by unions where
employers have tried to introduce them to meet their need for production or
service provision, rather than to provide any flexibility for employees, and
there are dangers of annualised hours schemes leading to worse terms and
conditions where unions have not been involved in negotiations.
The TUC guide Changing Times, however, says an "annual hours systems can be
innovative, productive and inclusive but their introduction should be approached
with care in order to achieve mutually beneficial results".
The introduction of an annual hours scheme may also be an opportunity to reduce
overall working hours, in exchange for the greater flexibility that the employer
has to arrange hours during the week or year. The TUC guide includes a case
study of North Manchester General Hospital where an annual hours scheme was
implemented for nurses. Nurses say that the benefits of the scheme are that it
has given them greater control over their lives and more opportunities for
taking leave. Staff tend to consolidate time owed into blocks to be taken in the
summer when patient numbers are lowest. And patients have benefited from
improved care at times when more staff are needed.
It also gives the example of gardeners at Redditch Council, who were initially
unhappy about plans to reduce their hours in the winter in exchange for longer
hours in the summer. However they now prefer the scheme, which gives them a four
day week in the winter and longer time off over the Christmas holiday, with
longer hours in the summer, but with no contractors, and savings being used to
create more jobs. Guidance from New Ways to Work, a charity promoting flexible
working, (Negotiating change: a guide to flexible work patterns for trade
unions) warns of the potential difficulties for workers with children if annual
hours are implemented in such a way that make it difficult to predict working
hours.
Home Working;
Interestingly, the Work-life balance Baseline study found the most common
reasons for working at home were "to get more done/it is more efficient" (38%)
and "the demands of the job" (35%). Very few gave caring responsibilities as the
reason for working from home.
The work-life balance initiatives proposed at Bury Metropolitan Borough Council
also included homeworking either on a permanent basis for part of their working
hours, or on a temporary basis for all of their working hours. It is seen as
particularly suitable for employees whose work needs sustained concentration
away from the interruptions of the office, such as those carrying out research,
or for disabled employees who may have difficulties travelling to and from work.
There are a number of points that need to be considered before homeworking is
made available to staff:
the suitability of particular jobs for homeworking;
the implications for office-based colleagues of homeworking by some staff;
potential isolation from colleagues and the workplace, that can be addressed,
for example, by regular telephone and e-mail contact (including by the union),
by working in the office for part of the week, or by attending regular team
meetings and social events;
the provision of suitable equipment for teleworking, and insurance;
health and safety consideration of the home workstation, including sufficient
space - a risk assessment will need to be carried out where it is used
regularly;
working hours - it is important that homeworkers take suitable breaks and can
switch off from their work when they have finished the day;
training and appraisal of home-based workers should not be overlooked; and
regular reviews of working arrangements should resolve any problems, and there
should be the option to return to office-based working.
Guidance for flexiplace employees concentrates on ensuring that managers and
colleagues know where you are and how you can be contacted, and suggests that a
buddy system could help by designating someone who will keep you informed of
what is happening in the office.
Self-rostering
In some industries employees have traditionally been able to organise working
patterns among themselves to ensure that individual needs are met. In some cases
this may simply be occasional swapping of shifts to accommodate commitments
outside work. Self-rostering, however, is a more regular arrangement where
employees are given control over organising their own working patterns.
Allowing workers to organise their own shifts among themselves has sometimes
been promoted as part of an initiative to improve work-life balance. At
Salisbury Healthcare NHS Trust, for example, self-rostering pilots in some areas
have been set up under the Improving Working Lives initiative.
One of the features of the TUC's work-life balance project with Bristol City
Council was the introduction of self-rostering among library staff as a solution
to unhappiness about the way managers organised rosters. Staff now have greater
control over the scheduling and organisation of their work, and a greater
flexibility to meet commitments outside work.
How do you take your leave?
In addition to trying to ensure that people's working week can allow them to
balance work and life, it is also important to ensure that sufficient time off
is available and that special leave is available for particular circumstances.
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Annual leave
Personalised annual leave
Parental leave
Career breaks and unpaid leave
Dependency leave
Carers leave
Pre-retirement leave
Other forms of leave
Workplace benefits
Childcare provision
Support for learning
Sports and social facilities
Annual leave
Three-quarters of non-manual public sector workers enjoy a basic annual leave
entitlement of 25 days or more, according to Bargaining Report October 2002, but
the majority of manual public sector workers (77%), however, only get 22 days
basic annual leave, and only 6% get 25 days or more. In the private sector, 28%
of non-manual workers get 21 days basic leave, with 24% getting 25 days or more.
The greatest number of manual workers in the private sector (46%) have 21 days
basic annual leave, and 25% get 25 days or more. The basic entitlement does not
include any additional service-related holidays, or the eight bank holidays a
year.
British workers, along with the Dutch, have the lowest number of bank holidays
of any workers in Europe. Workers in Northern Ireland have 10 days, in Italy 12
days, in Austria 13, and up to 14 in Spain and Portugal. The TUC is calling on
the government to review bank holiday entitlement and to give British workers an
extra three days every year.
Personalised annual leave
One way of increasing annual leave can be through a flexible benefits package
that allows employees some choice over the benefits they receive, for example
medical insurance, cars, childcare vouchers or holidays. Under such schemes
additional holiday can be bought, or unused holiday sold. However, staff should
not be encouraged to sell holidays, particularly if it takes them below the
basic entitlement negotiated by the union.
Employees should not be expected to use their annual leave entitlement for leave
for particular purposes, such as domestic or childcare emergencies, where other
time off arrangements should be negotiated. The following sections look at these
in more detail.
Parental leave
Parental leave gives working parents the right to take up to 13 weeks' unpaid
leave for children up to age five.
In the survey of UNISON branches for this guide, only 16% of respondents were
aware of their employers providing parental leave provision above the statutory
minimum.
Under the government's fallback scheme 21 days' notice must be given. Shorter
notice periods have been negotiated at the Department of Trade and Industry,
where the minimum requirement is one week's notice for up to two weeks' leave.
One way of taking parental leave may be in the form of reduced hours over a
period of time.
Parents working for the Department for Education and Skills (DfES) are entitled
to one day's special leave with pay when their child starts school. The leave
can be taken as one full day, or the equivalent hours spread over the first
week.
Career breaks and unpaid leave
Career breaks can be a way for employees to take a long period of time off to
care for young children or elderly relatives. In some cases they can be used for
study, travel or work abroad, also known as sabbatical leave, and has this has
been seen by some employers as a way of attracting young people into the
workforce and motivating and retaining older employees.
Commonly career breaks are for substantial periods of up to five years, but do
not necessarily give the right to return. However the better schemes guarantee
the right to return to an equivalent post.
Career break arrangements should include the right to be considered first for
any vacant posts on return to work within a given period of time. It is also
important that the employee maintains a continuing employment relationship in
order to ensure that their service is counted as continuous when they return.
This can be done through keeping in contact, and often arrangements are made for
keeping in touch with staff on career breaks, including forwarding of office
notices. Staff may also need refresher training when they return to work.
Healthcare Trust sabbatical leave should be available to staff to pursue
full-time education or training or to work abroad for a period of time which
will enhance his or her professional and personal development. Sabbaticals can
be either with or without pay.
The National Joint Council for Local Government guide, Finding the balance,
suggest that employers could consider a system of time banking or a
proportionate reduction in pay whilst at work to help employees to afford to
take advantage of career breaks.
Dependency leave
In addition to the legal right to unpaid time to deal with an emergency
involving a dependant, many employers provide a period of paid leave. This can
come under the heading of dependency leave, family leave, compassionate leave or
special leave. It can also sometimes include bereavement, although this is often
a separate entitlement.
The survey of UNISON branches found that 58% of employers had a policy of paid
leave for dependants, and a handful more allow paid time off on a discretionary
basis depending on the circumstances.
The TUC's negotiating target is 10 days of paid family leave with a wide scope
and wide definitions. A dependant is defined in the Department of Trade and
Industry (DTI) guidance on time off for dependants as "the partner, child or
parent of the employee or someone who lives with the employee as part of their
family. For example this could be an elderly aunt or grandparent who lives in
the household. It does not include tenants or boarders living in the family
home, or someone who lives in the household as an employee, for example, a
live-in housekeeper."
A good policy should also make it clear that same sex partners and extended
family members are covered, where the employee has significant responsibility
for them. It is particularly important that workers who have caring
responsibilities for elderly or disabled relatives are covered by the provision,
given the increasing number of workers with such responsibilities.
Carers leave
In addition to provision for parental and dependency leave, some employers offer
longer periods of leave to deal with childcare and other caring
responsibilities. This may help employees who otherwise might not be able to
remain in work.
The National Joint Council for Local Government guide, Finding the balance, says
that this form of leave could cover responsibilities such as;
assisting a dependant during and after a hospital stay;
providing support during a move to residential care or during a period of
illness;
adjusting to longer term care needs as a result of illness or accident; or
supporting an adult or child with disabilities.
Pre-retirement leave or
Flexible Retirement
Pre-retirement leave allows staff approaching retirement to reduce their working
hours in preparation for retirement for better work-life balance. It can be in
the form of additional days' leave to be taken during the last year of working,
or a shorter working week.
The LRD pay and conditions database, PayLine, has 18 examples of pre-retirement
leave, mainly in the private sector. At electricity companies National Grid,
Powergen and MEB up to 35 days' leave is available in the last year of working
with one day per year of service.
Other forms of leave
Many employers have a general "special leave" policy that can include a range of
circumstances for which employees might need time off. In addition to those for
caring and compassionate reasons described above, employees may need time off
for study, for political or other civic and public responsibilities, for
sporting activities or for interviews.
Study leave is time off given to employees to carry out education that is not
necessarily related to the job, although it may be to gain a professional
qualification. It is separate from agreements on workplace training that is
required for the job. In some cases the leave available is limited to "approved"
courses, although with the greater emphasis on learning in the workplace, this
may be widened. Some policies also have specific provision concerning time off
for examinations.
Some employers also grant time off for observing religious festivals and events
that are not covered by weekends and statutory bank holidays.
Workplace benefits
As well as improving working hours and providing leave that helps employees to
reduce the stress of fitting their working lives with their other
responsibilities, there are other benefits that can be included in discussions
about work-life balance.
These can include assistance with childcare provision, support for learning, or
sports or social facilities.
Childcare provision
UNISON branches were asked in the LRD/UNISON survey if their employer made any
provision for childcare, and 39% reported that they did. In a small number of
universities and hospitals this was in the form of a nursery, sometimes charging
a market rate and therefore not affordable to low paid workers.
Some also provided holiday play schemes. The childcare policy of Kingston
Hospital NHS Trust, for example, says that the trust "will aim to provide,
wherever possible and in response to appropriate demand, facilities in the
school holidays that will enable children aged 5 to 13 to be cared for during
the working day."
Costs to employees of childcare places are sometimes related to the age of the
child, and in some cases according to salary.
Support for learning
Encouragement for learning has been high on the union agenda in the last few
years with the TUC and individual unions involved in many successful union-led
learning initiatives.
The introduction of statutory rights for union learning reps from February 2003
gave greater powers to encourage learning through the workplace.
A number of health trusts have been promoting learning and training
opportunities in different ways.
Learning is also an integral part of a work-life balance project being piloted
by the civil service union PCS and the Inland Revenue in Brighton, known as the
Our Time project. One of the features of the project, supported by the TUC, is
the establishment of learning centres in three area offices. Staff have free
access to computers during the working day for both vocational and
non-vocational courses. This has involved changing the flexitime system so that
staff can carry out learning during the day and make up the time later in the
evening.
Sports and social facilities
The Environment Agency Sports and Social Policy says that "it is important to
provide employees with the opportunity to participate in social and sporting
activities with colleagues outside of the workplace, particularly for new
recruits and employees who move to other Agency locations." Employees may form
sports and social clubs, with the employer paying half of subscription charges
and additional funding being available from the head office. Reasonable time is
available to staff for making arrangements for sport and social club events
where it is not possible to do this outside of working hours.
Waveney PCT is developing a structured plan to help and encourage all staff to
keep fit during work. This may include stretching exercises for clerical workers
for example.
Resource recap with some
additional info:
Flexible Working
Arrangements
Job-sharing
Term-time working and school-hours
Working from home
Flexible retirement
Career breaks/unpaid leave
Personalised annual leave
Special leave for family/domestic reasons
What UNISON Does locally Tackling Britain’s long-hours culture and getting a better balance between work
and the rest of life has moved high up the trade union agenda in recent years.
The number of people working long hours in Britain has risen to over four
million in the past 10 years despite legislation aimed at curbing excessive
hours working. Long hours are linked to ill health, stress and low productivity.
Job-sharing
This is where two (or more) employees share one job. The best schemes do not
unreasonably restrict the range of posts that can be job-shared, ensure that job
sharers have equal treatment with full time staff and take responsibility for
filling job share vacancies as they arise.
Term-time working and
school-hours
Term time working can be problematic. For example, many UNISON members working
in schools, such as classroom assistants and school meals staff, work term time
hours only because the employers are unwilling to pay them for the full year. In
most cases staff on term-time only contracts are disbarred from claiming state
benefits for the holiday periods, even though they are not being paid.
However, where such agreements are voluntary, they can give much welcome
flexibility to parents of school-age children by enabling them to work during
term time (and/or school hours) and take the school holidays off. The best
schemes enable staff to spread their pay over 12 months of equal payments to
avoid periods with no, or severely reduced, pay.
Working from home
Working from home on a regular or ad-hoc basis can give employees additional
flexibility but there are a number of issues for UNISON reps to consider. In
some organisations, working from home is an option only for staff over a certain
grade and UNISON negotiators may want to consider whether in practice such
restrictions are reasonable. The health and safety implications of home-working,
particularly where such arrangements occur regularly, need to be considered, and
may include the need to carry out risk assessments under health and safety laws.
And staff may need to be covered by insurance and supplied with office equipment
or reimbursed for the use of their home facilities eg telephone. Staff can
become isolated if they are permanently home-based workers and keeping in touch
with the organisation and receiving proper support, supervision and feedback is
important.
Flexible retirement
This can enable employees approaching retirement to gradually reduce the time
they spend at work in preparation for their retirement. Work Life Balance
retirement schemes are being used to reconfigures staff teams eg a retired
member of staff has returned to work in a part-time post with lesser
responsibility, enabling their experience and expertise to be retained by the
organisation.
Career breaks/unpaid leave
These enable staff to retain their employment whilst taking a break from work.
This might be for study, travel or to cover a caring need, for example. The best
schemes ensure that staff on leave are kept in touch with the organisation while
they are away and have the right to return to their job, or an equivalent post,
on the same terms and conditions at the end of the period of leave. Often these
schemes are only available to staff with a minimum length of service.
Personalised annual leave
This is available in some organisations to give staff some flexibility over the
amount of annual leave they take. Where such arrangements are introduced unions
will need to ensure that the requirements of the Working Time Regulations are
being met.
Special leave for
family/domestic reasons
Legal rights established in the Employment Rights Act 1999 give all employees
the right to take time off work to help people such as family members or friends
who depend on them for assistance in an emergency (time off for dependants). It
covers situations such as when a dependant falls ill, when childcare
arrangements break down or if a parent’s presence is required at school. The law
does not specify how much leave can be taken and there is no right to be paid
while taking this leave.
What UNISON Does locally
The sorts of flexible working arrangements that will suit particular workplaces
and individual departments or sections will depend on the needs of the staff who
work there and the demands of the service they provide. UNISON branches can take
the initiative to develop flexible working arrangements by carrying out a staff
survey to find out what sort of working arrangements staff may like to see
introduced or changed. The results can then form the basis of negotiations with
management. The examples above show what has been achieved in workplaces
elsewhere and have been proved to work in practice to the benefit of both staff
and the organisation. If managers are resistant to the idea of flexible working,
emphasise the business case: Improved staff morale, lower sickness and
absenteeism, better recruitment and longer retention.
Checklist:
Partnership
Staff participation
Transparency and Fairness
The Law and Health & Safety
Implementation
Variety of Flexibility
The Business Case
Partnership – UNISON needs to be fully involved at
all stages of development, implementation, evaluation and monitoring of flexible
working arrangements
Staff participation – staff need to be consulted
from the start and fully involved
Transparency and Fairness – policy and procedures
need to be clearly laid down and fairly applied, managers need proper training
The Law and Health & Safety – any flexible working
arrangements need to fully comply with employment law and health and safety
requirements and best practice
Implementation – policies need to apply in
practice, UNISON ensures these are properly implemented within the Suffolk NHS
system
Variety of Flexibility – everyone’s needs are
different, the greater the variety of flexible arrangements the organisation can
offer the greater the appeal it will have to the largest number of staff
The Business Case – Flexible working will help
improve service long term. |
