Meeting documents

To receive a verbal update

The Chief Fire Officer advised Members that the reason for the verbal update was that the situation was changing so quickly. Firefighter pay was determined by the National Joint Council (NJC) who were representatives of the Employers, who were Councillors from fire authorities and representatives from the representative bodies, the Fire Brigades Union (FBU) being one of them.

The Chief Fire Officer advised Members that earlier in the year the NJC made a pay offer to the Fire Brigades Union for firefighters which was 2% backdated to July 2017. The 2% would be paid locally out of local budgets and then a further 3% would be funded by government and the NJC would lobby government for that further 3%. Also included in the offer were talks on a further pay formula going forward over the next number of years. Some of the detail attached to the offer were that emergency medical response (co-responder) should continue and firefighters would take on other emergency response roles within the community. The FBU Executive Council recommended that Members of the FBU should accept the offer but the Executive Council had their recommendation overturned as the Membership decided to reject the offer.

The Chief Fire Officer advised Members that the NJC then wrote to the FBU and offered to pay the 1% already identified within the budget, with a no strings attached agreement, while they continued discussions. The FBU did not agree this position and since then one fire authority had subsequently paid their staff 1%.

The Chief Fire Officer advised Members that he had subsequently received a letter from the FBU (Members had a copy in front of them), which said they would be taking any authority who decided to pay the 1% to court. The reason being was that the FBU want to maintain a national collective agreement. The FBU do not want fire authorities to go off and pay different rates of pay etc.

The Chief Fire Officer advised Members that he had asked the Director of Legal and Governance to look at the risks of paying the 1%, if Members were minded to do so, there was no recommendation to do so, but he wanted to get a steer from the Authority.

The Director of Legal and Governance advised Members that the letter to the Authority was quite unequivocal of the FBU’s intentions should the Fire Authority be minded to make a 1% offer. The legislation to which the FBU were referring to, was Section 145B of TULR(C)A and had typically been used where local authorities had moved away from nationalised pay to local pay.

If an employer had made an offer to move to local terms and conditions the member can take the ‘sweetener’ but they can also take a claim to the Employment Tribunal. If the Employment Tribunal finds that the sole or main purpose of the inducement was to seek to move from a collective agreement, there would be a mandatory award made of £3,907 per claimant.

The Director of Legal and Governance advised that without commenting on the merits of the case, and the strength of their argument, the Authority would run a risk if it were to lose, of quite a considerable sum. Even if the Authority was to defend the claim against it and win, it would incur irrecoverable time, effort and costs. This was something Members would need to take into account.

The Chairman advised Members that the issue before the Authority was that it had the opportunity to pay a 1%, no strings attached, pay increase to its firefighters back dated to 1 July 2017. The Authority could take that decision. However, if the Authority were to do that, it would be exposing itself to an extremely large financial risk because of the threat from the FBU to take fire and rescue authorities who paid it to court.

The Chief Fire Officer advised Members that the letter from the FBU stemmed from the fact that one authority, Kent Fire and Rescue Authority, had gone ahead and decided to pay the 1%.

A Member asked if firefighters were aware of the situation and it was requested that the Chief Fire Officer write to all operational members of staff to acquaint them with the current position.

It was proposed by Councillor Wilson and seconded by Councillor Marland:

This Authority calls on the Employers side of the National Joint Council to make a fair and reasonable offer to enable an early and just settlement that will amongst other objectives a) reward our firefighters and other staff for their hard work, b) enhance our ability to recruit and retain staff and c) enable us to match our vision of Buckinghamshire and Milton Keynes, being the safest place to live, work and travel.

On being put to the vote there being 11 votes in favour, 2 votes against and 2 abstentions, the motion was lost.

The Chairman advised that the Authority noted the position of Kent Fire and Rescue Authority but the Authority would not be considering paying the 1% backdated to July 2017 budgeted for, because of the exposure to risk.

(Councillor Marland left the meeting)