Classroom Teaching Assistants (Cumbria)

Robert Neill Excerpts

Wednesday 16th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Robert Neill)]

May I congratulate the hon. Member for Workington (Tony Cunningham) on securing this debate and thank him and the other Members who have spoken for the way in which they raised an issue about which people in their part of the country clearly feel very strongly. I understand that. It is classically and appropriately one of the functions of an Adjournment debate in the House to raise issues that involve strong local feeling.

As I will explain, and as the hon. Gentleman and other Members will know, the Government’s role in decisions on pay and conditions and on work force issues is limited, but I will set it out. This debate has, none the less, given them an opportunity to vent the views of their constituents, and, as someone who has served as a member of a local authority and as a school governor, including at a special school, where particular demands were placed on the staff, I recognise and completely understand the issues to which they referred.

These decisions are essentially for the county council, as they are for any other local education authority, so it is probably appropriate that I set out factually the legal position that gives rise to the situation in relation to equal pay and single status on the one hand, and to the terms and conditions of the employment of teaching assistants on the other, because obviously in the case before us the two are interlinked.

Historically, the terms and conditions on which teaching assistants and many other local government staff are employed are decided not by central Government but by local authorities. In principle, that is right and proper, because they are generally best placed to do so. As hon. Members will know, there is a well-established mechanism in place with the National Joint Council for Local Government Services and other negotiating bodies of employers, trade unions, and other work force representatives that historically deal with these matters.

It is worth putting the single status agreement, which gives rise to this, into that context. The single status agreement is a national agreement between the trade unions and local government employers. The Government welcome the greater transparency that the agreement provides. Its principle is a good one, in line with the fact that we remain committed to promoting equal pay and ending discrimination in the workplace. I do not think that the underlying principles, or the agreement itself, are an issue between any of us. The signatories, including any local authority and the relevant trade unions, commit themselves to placing the majority of their work force into a single pay and grading structure, which is generally referred to as the green book structure. That provides the harmonisation that we all want and increases transparency.

Things such as spine points, which are familiar to all those of us who have been in local government, are set by the national joint council. However, the decision on where employees are placed on the pay spine is a matter for the local authority. Although virtually all local authorities remain within the scheme, it is not compulsory; Government cannot compel authorities to be a member. Some authorities—I think only three, in fairness—have opted out in relation to areas such as school support staff. Broadly speaking, however, the scheme works satisfactorily and efficiently.

The fact that there is that need to place employees on a single scale means that local authorities need to go through a process of ensuring that equally valued work is paid an equal amount, so that they can then assess whether they are meeting their obligations under the Equality Act 2010. The implementation of the single status agreement, following several court judgments that have been pretty well publicised, has revealed some historical inequalities in pay. For that reason, authorities such as Cumbria, and many others, have carried out job evaluation exercises. Of course, the outcomes and decisions taken are individual matters for each authority, but many have gone through the process.

[Tony Cunningham]

Does the Minister accept, though, that if the process itself is flawed, we end up with a very different result than we would if it were a proper process?

[Robert Neill]

Any local authority must act properly in carrying out a process. As we have heard, an appeals process is in place. I am told—in a sense, I am relaying factual information held by my Department—that because, as has rightly been observed, there is a very high number of appeals, schools have been invited to nominate a representative for each post being appealed to attend a hearing on behalf of their colleagues. It is a little bit like a class action in the courts. That is not a decision that Government take or can impose; that is the view that has been taken.

[Tim Farron]

Will the Under-Secretary take the view that it is wrong, given the volume of appeals, to decide that the majority will simply not be heard? Is not that an obvious signal that the county council has botched this grade?

[Robert Neill]

It is dangerous and not helpful if I make a judgment on something to which the Department and I are not party, because I am not seized of all the evidence. However, I observe as a matter of common sense and of law that any employer who goes through a process has to meet their obligations under employment law more generally. It is probably best that Ministers do not try to advise either party about employment law, but it is a factor that everybody has to bear in mind in ensuring that any process is appropriate.

[Mr Reed]

The Under-Secretary is being generous with his time and I genuinely appreciate the constructive way in which he is trying to engage with the issues. I also feel for him because he has to answer the debate. Does he agree that it might be a more elegant and effective fit if he went back to his colleagues in government, particularly the Secretary of State for Education, and asked him to reinstate the School Support Staff Negotiating Body? That abolition, which the Secretary of State for Education announced last October, has landed the process in the single status framework, where it should not be.

[Robert Neill]

Of course all Ministers always take back to their colleagues matters that overlap, and that is on the record in Hansard for all to see. Let me deal with the specific point about the School Support Staff Negotiating Body. The previous Government set it up, and the hon. Gentleman is right to say that that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education decided to bring those arrangements to an end. However, it is worth noting that that body had not reached agreement about any of the issues with which it was tasked. Its existence or non-existence therefore had no influence on the particular circumstances that were determined in Cumbria. We could have a separate debate about whether that was desirable, but the decision to discontinue the body had no impact on the pay and negotiations of the school support staff with whom we are concerned today. It is important to state that. However, the hon. Gentleman has raised the matter, and it is now on the public record.

[Mr Reed]

The Under-Secretary has been exceptionally gallant.

[Robert Neill]

I hope that I have been exceptionally factual. It is my duty to the House. Against that background, I hope that hon. Members will understand—