Issue - meetings

The Board is asked to review and scrutinise the decision of the Cabinet taken on 4 September 2024 in relation to the item of business relating to ‘Pay and Reward Final Position’, following the receipt of a valid call-in request from the pre-requisite number of councillors.

In accordance with the Constitution, the Board must determine whether or not to offer any advice in relation to the decision. If advice is offered, Cabinet will be required to reconsider the decision in light of the advice but is not obliged to follow it.

The Monitoring Officer presented a report, a copy of which had been circulated to each Member and a copy of which appears as Appendix 'A' to these Minutes in the Minute Book. The Monitoring Officer advised that following receipt of a valid call-in request from three Members of the Overview and Scrutiny Board, the Board was asked to review and scrutinise the decision of the Cabinet taken on 4 September 2024 relating to the business item “Pay and Reward Final Position”

The Board was informed that the call-in request has been considered as valid, as there were reasonable grounds that the decision was not made in accordance with the decision-making principles set out at Article 12 of the Constitution and in particular Article 12.1 h "explain what options were considered and give the reasons for the decision”

The Board was invited to consider the process by which Cabinet made its decision as opposed to the content of the substantive decision itself.

To assist the Board a procedure for the call-in was circulated:

·       Opportunity for the Trade Unions to input

·       Councillor presentation of the Call-in

·       Response to the Call-in by the Cabinet

·       Summing up – 10 mins

·       Debate

·       Motions/Voting  

Following the Monitoring Officer’s introduction representatives of Trade Unions, Unite and GMB both addressed the Board and shared concerns around the call-in and the potential delay to the Pay and Reward Process and information on the union’s involvement with the Pay and Reward process up to this point.

The Lead Call-in member then went on to advise of their reasons for calling-in the decision and explained that the decision would impact almost 5000 members of staff and it was important to get this right for both staff and BCP residents. It was noted that there was a statement within the Cabinet report which made the assumption that there were no other options for the Cabinet to consider and therefore this did not allow the Cabinet to make a fully informed decision. The other members who had signed the call-in also made statements to the Board to explain their reasons for supporting the Call-in, a particular concern being that whether the information supplied to Cabinet was sufficient.

It was suggested by the Call-in members that the Board may wish to offer the following advice to Cabinet:

1. The OS board recommends that Cabinet reexamines its decision to agree the final negotiated position and financial costs associated with implementing pay and reward to consider:

a)    All options considered in formulating the final negotiated position;

b)    The short, medium and long term cost effectiveness of the final position, by comparison of all other options considered;

c)       If the annual incremental pay structure results in a structure that ensures colleagues are treated equally and fairly, and that colleagues doing the same work will receive equal pay.

2.     That following approval of Pay and Reward Cabinet requests, the Audit and Governance Committee to review the process used by the Council in formulating, negotiating and approving the pay  ...  view the full minutes text for item 38