February Branch meeting minutes

Below are the minutes from our February branch meeting, written up by our new assistant secretary. Please add comments if you wish to have any changes made. The minutes will stay in draft until they are agreed at the next branch meeting.

Unite Branch Meeting: 3^rd February 2012.

Chair: Andrew Curtis

Apologies:

Jenny

John Brown

Mike Dyer (late due to Meeting)

Minutes from previous meeting:

Due to Some Confusion and an oversight there are no minutes from the previous meeting, Laura Sweeney will take the minutes from each meeting and they will then be posted on the website.

Secretary’s Report: Stewart Wakeham-Munro

There is very little to report as things are still quiet after Christmas in the New Year and things are expected to get busier in February.

The branch bank account has been set up and we are just waiting on the paper work to come through for the funding.

We have had a request from the charity “Woman at Risk” for funding but Mike has more info on this,

Confirmation of the Labour Party Affiliation and that our funds will not be affected.

Stewart was unsure how much money was in the branch account and was unsure if this would be backdated (if it was it would be an additional £40 or £50). Mike will do a written report on the bank account.

Woman’s Reports:

Nothing to report at this time as Stewart mentioned thing will probably get busier in February.

Website:

The website has now been set up. There is a G-mail account attached to the website which member are encouraged to use.  unitesvs@gmail.com

Royal London Report:

Nothing much to report. The 6 Underwriters who moved to Edinburgh from Glasgow were all voluntary moves.

There were also some redundancies but again these were all people who wanted to leave.

There are some more moved marked for Quarter 4 of this year but again all those involved have already been informed and will go through further consultation.

Capita Report:

Again not much to report. The bad weather policy in Life and pensions has been clarified and made it easier to understand. If the employee arrives late they do not need to make up the time but if they did not come in at all then they may need to make the time up.

The Pay deal has been finalised, as this is the second year of the two-year pay deal agreed last year. Looks like the average weekly earning is sitting a 2% so as per the structure last year. Rating 1 will gain 4%, Rating 2 will gain 2%, rating 3 will gain 1% and Rating 4 will get 0.5% and rating 4 and being on a PIP will mean no increase in salary.

Health and Safety – nothing to report but any ongoing concerns should be reported to Chris Biggam.

ITS Report:

Again hardly anything to report.

The employee forum met but people were unsure how the people were selected for this; Mike explained that it was on a volunteer basis. But this has been fluctuation due to Capita changing their minds about the number of people on the forum and attempting to reduce the number of union member on the forum.

Pay deal will only apply to unionised areas of the business. Those areas of the business which are not unionised will not be getting a pay rise due to the pay freeze applied this year.

Treasures Report:

The Bank account and cheque book have almost been finished but we have run into a problem in that we cannot confirm the bank account without the Unite Branch number and we cannot get the Branch number until we have the bank account number. As soon as the account is set up we should be getting between £250 and £300 a month.

Mike put forward a suggestion for buying some TUC procedures book and some rep manuals. They are £18 each.   He will email other branches to see if they want to buy as any if we buy in bulk we get them much cheaper. The suggestion was agreed with no objections.

Mike has stated that he will get a proper balance sheet set up for the next meeting so that all finances can be finalized.

Any Other Business:

Steven was nominated as a rep for the Royal London side of the business and Stewart will speak to mike about the paperwork for the next meeting.

Everyone should be receiving ballot papers for the LGBT (Lesbian, Gay Bisexual and Transsexual) seat in the upcoming Executive Committee Election. Mike advised to vote for Harry McNulty.

Harry is greatly supported by other LGBT committees and has worked in Northern Ireland, Scotland and the UK supporting many LGBT issue.

Steven asked if the Royal London member moving to Edinburgh would still remain attached to our branch of Unite or if they would need to form their own branch. Mike advised that the Unite committee would cover them and they would need to appoint a rep. The committee covers all members in Glasgow Edinburgh and Reading.

Steven also mentioned that he is a fire warden but had not had updated training in the last 3 or 4 years and that this was a heath and safety risk not only to him and the Royal London staff he is supposed to take care of during a fire drill but also to Capita staff as if he instructs Royal London Employees the wrong thing this could cause and accident which could injure people. Chris confirmed that this would need to be raised through Royal London Channels but that it would also be raised through Capita channels as it may affect capita employees.

Next meeting

Mike will sort out the affiliations for the next meeting but has encouraged other members to make suggestions.

The Next branch meeting as been scheduled for March.