Great Western Branch Activity Update 2nd Quarter 2024
At the AGM a proposal was put forward and carried to report on the Branches activities on a quarterly basis. The proposal adopted was specific in the ‘headings’ to be used when reporting. This is the first of these reports.
Extract form proposal:
“This would include basic information the branches industrial activity in terms of meetings, workplace visits, influence and activity, and number of successfully resolved disputes.”
Meetings
Regular meetings have taken place in Openreach, FTTP, Networks and also the South West Regional BT Committee.
Workplace visits
There have been workplace visits taking place across the length and breadth of the Branch’s territory. These range from regular H & S visits to accident investigations. Recruitment activities and attendance at Disciplinary hearings, Return 2 Works and Grievances are among the workplace visits that have taken place.
The Branch is unable to share specific details of Disciplinary, Return 2 Works and Grievances because of the confidentiality that is afforded to each case. However, we have set up a data base to log all disciplinaries, Return 2 works and Grievances and in future reports the Branch will be able to give numbers and trends.
Influence and activity
For those that pay the political levy, contributions were made to aid the elections for the following Labour candidates:
Dan Aldridge, Western super Mare
Will Stone, Western super Mare
Lloyd Hatton, South Dorset
Clare Moody, Police & Crime Commissioner Avon & Sommerset
Women’s Report; The Branch conducted a survey to understand the issues that women were facing in the Openreach workplace. This was instigated at a meeting with Clive Selly CEO Openreach in response to issues raised by the branch. The report which is a comprehensive piece of research involved interviewing and questionnaire with the outcomes tabled and presented to the senior management and board members, not only in Openreach but across all the business units within BT Group.
The Branch’s website has been upgraded and I urge all our members to take a look it’s a treasure trove of information.
The branch has a representative at the TUC conference
Successfully resolved disputes
A grading Pay issue has been resolved in Openreach with the help of the National Executive. There have significant “wins’ for individual members around P&Ds, special leave, pay, redundancy and adjustments enabling returning to work. For confidentiality details cannot be shared.