Dear Members,
Please find below an email to ACAS detailing UNISON’s response to Cornerstone’s Position Statement to them. This email has already been shared with the Chief Executive by ACAS. Point 1 will be of particular interest.
To ACAS Scotland from Mike Kirby, UNISON Scottish Secretary.
I acknowledge receipt of the Cornerstone position statement which you have forwarded.
Please find below the UNISON Scotland response to each point, which I should be grateful if you would share with Cornerstone CEO Edel Harris, with the wish that these observations may facilitate a return to discussions at ACAS.
1. The CFO has worked out the costs of backdating the money based on ‘actual’ (not ‘average’) sleepovers already undertaken and the total non-budgeted additional cost would be £2.3million.
Response:- UNISON understands that this is the cost minus any funding that Councils have provided. The actual cost to Cornerstone (which has not been already paid to them by Councils) is much less. In our relayed discussion of 20 March at ACAS, the cost of moving sleepovers from 1 October to 1 September was quoted as £37,000, this would suggest a more reasonable estimate of a move to 1 April as c. £222,000.
2. We haven’t received funding from HSCPs to cover the costs of paying sleepovers at SLW rate.
Response:- Scottish Government position is that it is paid, as announced by Health Secretary Shona Robison on 19/10/17. Further emphasised by the circular of May 2018 Update on the Scottish Living Wage commitment for adult social care workers, to Chief Officers HSCPs / LA Chief Executives issued by the Living Wage Implementation Group including Scottish Government, COSLA, CCPS, Scottish Care, STUC, and most recently by letter of 20 December 2018 from Cabinet Secretary for Health & Sport, Jeane Freeman MSP.
In the 2018-19 budget (www.gov.scot/publications/scottish-budget-draft-budget-2018-19/) Derek Mackay said:
“In 2018-19 we will provide an additional £66 million to bring the Carers (Scotland) Act 2016 into force, to continue to support the delivery of the Living Wage for adult social care workers, and to increase payments for free personal and nursing care. In 2018-19 an additional £66 million is included in the Local Government settlement allocations to support additional expenditure by local government on social care in recognition of a range of pressures they and integration authorities are facing, including support for the implementation of the Carers (Scotland) Act 2016, maintaining our joint commitment to the Living Wage (including our agreement to now extend it to cover sleepovers following the further work we have undertaken) and an increase in the Free Personal and Nursing Care payments.” This money is available through HSCPs.
3. 50% of similar organisations were cited within a recent CCPS report as not paying the SLW for sleepovers in 2018/19 for similar reasons outlined above.
Response:- All employers whom UNISON work with are asked to backdate sleepovers to 01/04/18. UNISON remains in talks with some employers as funding has not been received yet, but the concept of backdating to 01/04/18 has been accepted.
4. Some of these social care organisations have collective bargaining arrangements with Unison and our Board cannot understand why the same isn’t being asked of those organisations?
Response:- All employers whom UNISON work with are asked to backdate sleepovers to 01/04/18. UNISON remains in talks with some employers as funding has not been received yet, but the concept of backdating to 01/04/18 has been accepted.
Cornerstone advised UNISON that the pay offer was a full and final offer which had already had Board approval. This precluded us from utilising Stage 1 (raising the issue with the Chief Executive) and Stage 2 (raising the issue with the Board) of the disputes procedure.
5. In Unison’s annual report 2019, where they reference the SLW rate for sleepovers, it acknowledges that “currently this is only a political aspiration and not a legal requirement”
Response:- UNISON is clear that it is not a legal requirement. However, it is a Scottish Government position that it is paid, as announced by Health Secretary Shona Robison on 19/10/17. Further emphasised by the circular of May 2018 Update on the Scottish Living Wage commitment for adult social care workers, to Chief Officers HSCPs / LA Chief Executives issued by the Living Wage Implementation Group including Scottish Government, COSLA, CCPS, Scottish Care, STUC, and most recently by letter of 20 December 2018 from Cabinet Secretary for Health & Sport, Jeane Freeman MSP.
Regards,
Mike.
Mike J Kirby
Scottish Secretary
UNISON