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Agenda item

Pay Policy Statement for 2024/2025

Decision:

To agree the Pay Policy 2024/2025 and recommend Council to approve it.

Minutes:

7.1  The Committee noted that under the Localism Act 2011 Hackney Council was required to publish an annual pay policy statement.  The draft statement updates the 2023/24 statement and was approved by Hackney Council. The 2024/25 statement had to be approved by a resolution of the Council before 31 March 2024. Committee members noted in the published report that there had been no substantive changes to the policy. The statement details current pay practice, and no new policy principles were being introduced.

 

7.2  There was brief discussion about the report wherein the following points were noted:

·  At paragraph 5.2 of the published report it was noted that Hackney Council was facing considerable challenges in implementing the nationally  negotiated pay deal for 2023/24 which has averaged around 6%, surpassing the initially budgeted 4% for 2023/24;

·  National pay agreements were negotiated at central government level which Hackney Council, like other local authorities, were provide a view on. The negotiation took a considerable amount of time and Hackney Council in response would try to forecast as much as possible ahead of those negotiations;

·  Chief Executive’s pay in comparison to the median total pay the ratio had gone down. Chief Executive’s salary was a ‘spot salary’, which was a single hourly/weekly pay rate, or a single annual salary, attached to each job.  At the time there was recruitment campaign for  a Chief Executive there would a salary review of what the spot salary should be and benchmarking would be included as part of that process. The Chief Executive’s pay would rise in line with the nationally negotiated pay agreements. What then could occur was that the gap was then narrowed based on other negotiations for different levels of colleagues in pay and salary. This too was very much impact by negotiations made at central government level. To some extent the percentage of awards to the Chief Executive groups had been less than those in the much more junior and less paid workforce;

·  The report included benchmarking information with a selection of Boroughs that neighbour Hackney or were considered comparable. Hackney Council needed to understand the roles that it had and the opportunities that it was seeking to advertise in the future with the Council being mindful of the comparative salaries. Most of the local authorities would use the same job evaluation schemes so that they would be broadly similar and it would allow Hackney Council to retain those staff that they need;

·  Hackney Council had in place a mechanism to take into account instances when there was high salary demands. Benchmarking was used when taking into account Market Supplements. Where extensive research was undertaken by the Council around salaries that were paid and was aligned with workforce shortages and where the Council had tried and was proved that the Council had been unable to recruit to a role. It was not common practice within the borough as the Council was able to attract candidates as best it could. Where there was challenges the Council would address the issue on a case by case basis;

·  Any discussions around budgets would not just involve salaries it would also include the cost of the salaries e.g. pensions. Discussions may also take some time particularly if the Trade Unions may wish to consult the salary offer with their members. With last year’s salary offer two of the three trade unions accepted the offer meaning that green book staff received the offer but red book staffs pay offer was delayed because of their trade unions continued negotiations;

·  In a cost living of crisis trade unions needed to think carefully when consulting with their members to ensure staff received their salary increase in a timely manner should they wish to hold out and continue negotiations;

·  With delays in processing salary offers, due to continued trade unions negotiations, there was a knock on effect on those red book staff directly affected as well those payroll staff who would be processing the offer;

·  Salary negotiations with the trade unions in some instances had gone into the next financial year. As soon as the agreement was reached the Council then had put in place measures in the Payroll team to ensure staff are paid as soon as possible it can prove challenging with the transactional changes that needed to be made.

 

The Councillors present at the meeting thanked the Council’s Payroll Team for all their hard work in 2023 for processing staff salaries following the agreement of the salary offer by the trade unions.

 

The Council’s Director of Human Resources and Organisational Development stated that because the Council was dealing with a national agreement their negotiating team was aware of the implications around the offer. There was an expectation that there would be different representations over the negotiation period but there would be a point where there was a final offer made to the trade unions and then a matter of waiting for them to respond.

 

The Committee welcomed in appendix 1, the Pay Policy Statement, the inclusion of market supplements and they were used they were continually assessed at least every two years. Committee members felt that really good job role analysis mitigated against the use of market supplements.

 

On the issue of severance pay, the Council’s Director of Human Resources and Organisational Development clarified that why its inclusion was statutory the Council had to provide evidence on how it acted. All local authorities had to undertake this.  Hackney Council had to ensure that it was included in its pay policy statement.

 

RESOLVED:

 

To agree the Pay Policy 2024/2025 and recommend Council to approve it.

Supporting documents: