Dear friends
Last Wednesday, Unite representatives met with members of St Mungo’s Leadership Team in Stage 3 of the Avoidance of Dispute procedure.
We explained that the pay rise for 2021/22 was an outrage. By the end of that year, inflation was in double figures. The pay rise of 1.75% was a joke. Not funny and not in good taste, but a joke. At no point during the entire financial year 2021/22 was the inflation rate that low, or even close.
This month, the Retail Price Index reached 12.3%. Yet the proposed flat rate pay rise for 2022/23 ranges from 4% to about 10%, depending on your current wages.
In real terms, that means a huge pay cut followed by another pay cut. And the effect of these cuts is cumulative.
Pay cuts have damaging consequences. According to management’s own surveys, confidence in the Leadership team is at a low ebb and the proportion of St Mungo’s workers who want to stay with the organisation has fallen drastically. There are vacancies across the organisation and 12% of the wages bill was spent on agency staff. Without more realistic pay for directly-employed workers, the financial haemorrhage to agencies will continue and St Mungo’s risks being unable to fulfil its contracts.
St Mungo’s Leadership Team listened politely as we explained about the unfairness of these pay cuts, the hardships suffered by workers and their families and the fear of being unable to pay electricity and gas bills. One member of the Executive Team said he completely agreed with us. But by the next day, they seemed to have forgotten. The report of the meeting on the intranet said it “focused on our finances and the complexities of our cash flow as an organisation.”
But they were quite forgetful about that, too. When we asked straightforward questions about St Mungo’s finances, those present – including the Interim Chief Executive and the Executive Director for Finance – said they did not know the answers.
The following day, we submitted a petition signed by 544 St Mungo’s workers, asking for a decent pay rise. Ms Beidas assured us that the Board of Trustees would take account of it. The same day, St Mungo’s Unite members met and confirmed that we would not accept management’s offer.
We know that St Mungo’s can afford to do better than it has done. But this is not likely to happen without any pressure from us.
Please talk about the dispute to colleagues, especially those who are not Unite members. You can forward emails about the dispute to anyone who may be interested. And encourage them to join Unite – information about our ‘member get member’ scheme is here: www.unitetheunion.org/why-join/member-offers-and-benefits/member-get-member/
If you have any questions about the ongoing dispute, please get in touch.
Best wishes,
Jacob
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