Devon & Somerset Branch

INDUSTRIAL ACTION BALLOT WITHDRAWN

As you will now know, the BT Pay Industrial Action Ballot was withdrawn on the Morning of 5th July 2010 (the result was due at noon of that day).

The reasons for that withdrawal, were based on Legal Advice given to the CWU throughout the period of the Ballot. Unfortunately the legal system surrounding Industrial Action for Trade Unions is a minefield, these were created by Thatcher & her Tory Government during the 80s to curtail the Trade Union Movement.

Furthermore the failure of New Labour to address & repeal some of those anti-trade union laws is also very evident.

You will appreciate that we can not go into the finite detail of those legal reasons, but I feel you need an explanation as to why the ballot was withdrawn.

Once the Union notified the company of its intention to hold an Industrial Action Ballot, BTs full legal team plus other advisors possibly, went into overdrive and wrote to the union with a list of questions (challenges) some of which are straight forward, but others which need an accurate response, the law states that the Union must supply the company with numbers of people affected and a list of locations where said employees work etc. Two of the challenges stemmed around that particular law, and it was those challenges that after advice was sought from our QC (and Legal Team) that we would probably lose in court, where the decision to withdraw the ballot was made. This was mainly for two reasons, if challenged in court and we lost, an immediate injunction would be served on the Union, as well as huge costs financially, the cost to the greater Trade Union Movement & its members so the risk was deemed to high. Likewise if the Ballot result was declared, and we informed the company that we did not wish to proceed with the Industrial Action because of the possible legal challenge, the company still could have served a court order and an injunction may still have been imposed, once again a very high risk strategy, setting legal precedent etc.

All in all the withdrawal was probably the most sensible option at that point, and the decision to re ballot the membership was being put in place.

We were informed that once the withdrawal notice was sent to BT Centre, an invitation to re-open negotiations was offered, so after an emergency Executive meeting, our Pay negotiators were instructed to return to the negotiating table to see if they could thrash out an improved offer.

The details of that offer are contained in the update on the Pay Page on this site, BT Pay Final Offer 2010 click this link.

This revised offer will be the subject of a consultative ballot, which we believe will commence on Monday 19th July 2010, the Branch will keep you informed using the usual sources including this website.