The Employers' Organisation's submission called for councils to move away from their "9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday" culture, and offer rates of pay that reflected local needs and conditions. But it stopped short of calling for the abolition of national pay bargaining, despite chancellor Gordon Brown's controversial call for regional pay deals in his most recent Budget.
Chartered Institute of Housing policy officer Sam Lister said the move could lead to a bidding war between councils experiencing difficulties recruiting staff. "The advantage of having a national agreement is that councils can't go too far off the track, and start offering much more than neighbouring authorities," he said. He added that housing officers were unlikely to see their wages rise if the Employers' Organisation submission was put into practice.
But Kate Hargreaves, managing director of recruitment consultant HERA, said many London boroughs were having difficulties in recruiting housing officers, and welcomed moves to free up pay structures. "Offers made by local authority employers simply don't match the expectation of prospective housing officers." have. They can afford to pick and choose what jobs they take," she said.
Neil Litherland, director of housing at Camden council, said: "What the Employers' Organisation is saying just reflects the way things are going anyway. Councils are already looking at using golden handshakes to secure employees with technical skills that are most in demand."
A source at the Association of London Government said the body broadly agreed with the Employers' Organisation's position. The ALG is to make its own submission to the pay commission on Tuesday.
Source
Housing Today
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