Minutes of Stage 2 Consortium Meeting - GMB Yorkshire and North ...

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estated that the Consortium would not start collective consultation untilJanuary 2013. PD said that Esther McVey would have to present a changeof date back to Parliament. JN said that the Trade Unions would end onFriday and they had two weeks off for Christmas and the New Year, andthe company had as well. The point the Consortium was making was thatif collective consultation started on 19 December there would be twoweeks when it would not be possible to consult. JC replied that shethought it appropriate that collective consultation started on 19 Decemberbecause if it did not it would mean that it didn’t start until one monthafter the announcement. JC added that the Remploy Board ran theCompany, not the Minister. JC added that the company was only closedfor three days. PD stated that JC was not the Minister and she was notresponsible for misleading Parliament, but JN has just offered theCompany a way out. JC acknowledged that and said that in terms ofpossibly extending the consultation period and absorbing the three dayChristmas break she was happy to consider that. PD replied that theMinister would still have to take it to Parliament.2.31 KH said that JC was a mean bugger, she was trying to rob people of onemonth’s money. She was a mean bugger who was trying to rob people. JNproposed that if both sides could agree around the table that because ofthe festive period 10 days would be added on, it would be OK. JC repliedthat she would not accept an extension at this stage but that it could bereviewed as we moved through consultation. KH said that there was nopoint going over it again, the Company had done this in stage 1. JC pointedout that the Company ended up on nearly 110 days for collectiveconsultation in stage 1. The Company was not being unreasonable. LWsaid that if JC was talking about last time, at the last meeting between theCompany and the Consortium PD had asked JC if they were still inconsultation and JC said yes, and then a week later JC emailed him andsaid it had finished. LW said that he had to be honest with JC and that hewould not trust her if she said that it was Wednesday and he would haveto look at three calendars to make sure.3. Future Consortium structure3.1 KH said that there were issues the Consortium wanted to deal with whichwas why they had requested a meeting. The Consortium had a full timeconvenor and a deputy convenor. When the Consortium last met with theCompany met in London, the Consortium made it clear that TG had takenon that role due to Steve Sergeant’s unfortunate illness and theConsortium expected him to stay in that role. JC agreed with theConsortium and it was understood that as TG was leaving the business, JCwould have a discussion with him about him repaying any redundancypayment and getting it later, or reemploying him without him having torepay his redundancy. JC had since come back with a story about otherunions challenging it. JC said that was incorrect. What she had said wasthat the Company could be setting a precedent in that particularcircumstance and the Company had been taking advice. KH stated that theCompany had done that before. Louise Parry had been given fullredundancy plus an enhanced rate and then she came back. JC replied thatJC to actionMinutes of stage 2 Consortium meeting 1 191212 amended final issued 250113 Page 16 of 26
it was not the same circumstances. KH disagreed, saying that it was thesame. JC said that she would not debate the matter. JC stated that shewould write to the national officers and give them the full details of whathas been advised if TG agreed, because it was about TG. JN said that JCneeded to write to TG. TG said that he wanted to come back and work forRemploy. It was a deputy convenor job. He was asked by the company anhour before he finished, after he had had his redundancy pay, he had hisP45. TG stated that he had agreed to repay everything back and the JobCentre had suspended his claim. TG stated that he understood the processnow from the other side. The problem was that we have differentdemands. TG wanted to stop on. TG stated that he would be suing forunfair dismissal because he should not have been made redundant whenhe was. GW said that he didn’t understand what JC was saying aboutsetting a precedent because the Company was only going to close EB onceand do things with the rest of the business once. But in two years’ time itwouldn’t be relevant. In terms of how things went forward, TG had a lot ofknowledge of the processes, a lot of knowledge of the Consortium. He hasthe respect of everybody and the very difficult processes over the next fewmonths would be much easier if he continued and from that perspective itwould be in the interest of good industrial relations. How it was done maybe down to a discussion between the Company and JN. The benefits forboth sides would far out-weigh any risk of setting a precedent.3.2 PD stated that it had been agreed to keep the convenor and deputyconvenor at the meeting in London. TG was asked an hour before hefinished what he wanted to do. It would not be a precedent and not anordinary job. The position was deputy convenor. PB would come in to it atsome stage because he was dealing with Scotland. The Company had anobligation to satisfy their agreement with the Unions. The Unions had puta name in and the name was TG. He had been doing the job for howeverlong and that should exclude him from redundancy until the last of theGMB members had gone. TG would do the Company more good with hisexperience of setting up cooperatives because the Unions would bepushing the Company to not bring in asset strippers but to encouragesocial enterprises. PD stated he would be asking Liz Sayce why herrecommendations had been ignored. The Company was doing nothing tostart setting up worker cooperatives and social interests and TG could giveUnion members that help. The GMB had moved on miles since the Yorkcooperative was set up with no finances, just on the will of the unions. TGhad now got quite a sophisticated system of explaining the help that wasneeded and the Company should not turn that away. The Company shouldhonour the commitment given to the Consortium some time ago. It couldbe done any way the Company wanted – TG paying back the money or afixed term contract to the end but the Consortium wanted to keep thedeputy convenor role and that was TG. And with that came someprotection like it did with the convenor. PD suggested that there should bean adjournment for lunch and the Company could consider it. PD restatedthat it would benefit the Company and the employees. If there was onefactory that TG could lead through the process of setting up their ownbusiness then it would be of benefit. JN commented that the employeesalso had to have the will to do it. PD said that he was asking the CompanyCompany torespondMinutes of stage 2 Consortium meeting 1 191212 amended final issued 250113 Page 17 of 26
Page 3 and 4: 2.3 In the case of Bolton it was mo
Page 7: company had bought the assets. Phil
Page 10 and 11: 2.17 JC said that the meeting was t
Page 12 and 13: previous week. AH replied that it w
Page 14 and 15: situation, Phil Hubbard had all the
Page 18 and 19: as a formal request that TG was kep
Page 20 and 21: consultation. AH replied that the c
Page 22 and 23: JS said that was what he did before
Page 24 and 25: January. JC replied she was not, be
Page 26: like to wish the company well but t

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