FCA pushes back on union recognition demands
The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has pushed back on union demands to give official recognition to Unite the Union as the representative of staff at the watchdog.
The new Unite general secretary Sharon Graham wrote to the regulator’s CEO Nikhil Rathi ten days ago, alleging that “staff at the Financial Conduct Authority are flooding to join Unite” after Rathi began a transformation programme which includes some changes to salaries.
No numbers were given though Unite have previously said the number of FCA staff joining the union has quadrupled since a consultation into a new pay structure was launched.
Graham demanded voluntary recognition of the union. However today the regulator’s chief people officer Siobhan Sheridan wrote back to Graham to “respectfully decline” the request and instead pointed the FCA towards the statutory recognition process overseen by the Central Arbitration Committee.
That process includes a ballot of employees, with a majority of employees who vote or 40 per cent within an agreed “bargaining unit” needed to vote for union recognition for the purposes of collective bargaining.
The union are citing as evidence of demand for recognition a petition which purports to have been signed by more than 2,000 FCA employees, although there is no way of ascertaining whether the individuals are FCA employees nor whether they have signed it more than once.
A City PM reporter was able to sign the petition this morning, despite using a City PM email address to do so.
“The statutory process means the views of colleagues who want collective bargaining through a particular trade union and those who do not wish to be represented in this way are properly accounted for, in a way voluntary recognition does not,” Sheridan’s letter, published on the FCA website, reads.
Unite claim that an ongoing consultation into new pay and rewards, if enacted, at the regulator will leave three quarters of staff having their pay reduced by 10 per cent.
This is largely due to the removal of the discretionary bonus, which Rathi is proposing to remove. An accompanying document to the consultation said the FCA does “not believe these one-off, cash payments made to the majority of colleagues have been effective at driving consistent strong performance and the bonus scheme lacks some of the features we ask of firms we regulate.”
The Unite figure is understood not to take into account a 2 per cent pay rise given this year, and FCA documents point out the changes to pay levels – including the introduction of private-sector-standard regional differences – will see 800 staff receive pay rises of around £3,800 as a result of the new grading system.
The FCA has also said in recent weeks that salaries at the regulator are competitive with the market elsewhere and that it has undertaken a “rigorous benchmarking exercise” looking at public and private sectors as well as professional and financial services.
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