Employee Request for a new Information and Consultation body - FAQs

Fujitsu intends to terminate Fujitsu Voice, its UK Information & Consultation body, from 14th January 2017. For information about what this means and to take action to protect your rights, see How to avoid being Fujitsu Voice-less.

This page is an FAQ about one of two channels open for employees to regain some of the rights they will lose with Fujitsu Voice. 10% of employees can support an Employee Request under Regulation 7 of the Information and Consultation of Employees (ICE) Regulations 2004. This would minimise the period employees are without information and consultation rights and ensure the replacement for Fujitsu Voice is legally enforceable.

Q - Because UNITE is organising the employee request, will the new agreement only apply to union members?

A - No, Negotiated Agreements established under the ICE Regulations must cover all employees within the undertaking (i.e. all UK employees of Fujitsu Services Limited), not just union members. Any employee must be allowed to stand for election to join the Special Negotiating Body which will try to agree the new arrangements with the company.

Q - Will all Fujitsu staff become covered by collective bargaining once this request is accepted by the CAC?

A - No, Information and Consultation is a separate channel of collective employee representation. Union recognition and collective bargaining is another separate channel.

UNITE campaigns for ALL Fujitsu staff in the UK to have access to BOTH of these channels. UNITE is also collecting support for union recognition, but that is a separate process which you can read about here.

Q - If I register my support, will my manager or the company find out I've done it?

A - NO ABSOLUTELY NOT! - After we reach 10%, Unite will send all the details of supporting employees to the Central Arbitration Committee (CAC). The CAC would then ask the company for a full list of UK employees and then cross-check the details of supporting employees provided by UNITE against the full list provided by the company.

Only the CAC will have access to both of these lists and will not pass them to the other party.

Q - Could I stand as a rep for the Special Negotiating Body once the request is processed by the CAC?

A - Yes, all UK employees of Fujitsu Services Limited will be entitled to stand as negotiating representatives in the election that will follow.

Q - Why don't you wait for the Fujitsu Voice termination notice period to expire?

A - Fujitsu have not outlined to employees what kind of information and consultation arrangement they are seeking for the UK after Fujitsu Voice ceases to exist. Left to the company, there is no guarantee any future arrangement will be legally enforceable or when the process of creating it would start. Employees starting the process ourselves will compel the company to have an information and consultation body that is legally enforceable and will minimise the period when we are without UK information and consultation rights.

Q - What if the company decides to trigger the negotiation process itself whilst UNITE is collecting details of supporting employees for an employee request?

A - Under Regulation 11 of the ICE Regulations 2004, Fujitsu is entitled to trigger the process to start negotiations without waiting for an employee request.

Any future body established by this mechanism would also have to be legally enforceable, so we would have achieved our aim. Employers only normally do this when they believe an employee request is likely to succeed and triggering the process will save them the hassle of a CAC claim.

Employees SHOULD NOT wait for the company to issue a notification as this allows management alone to decide when the process to establish a new body is started. This could result in a lengthy period were staff have no UK Information and Consultation rights. If we wait, there is no guarantee that Fujitsu would trigger the legal process rather than trying to set up something toothless outside the legal framework. That's why employees should proceed with triggering an employee request themselves to minimise the period without a consultation body and guarantee its legal status.

Q - Why is having a legally enforceable Information and Consultation body so important?

A - Unless an information body is legally enforceable, if the employer fails to consult employees about something, there is very little employees can do about it. This was the problem with the old UKCF, the predecessor to Fujitsu Voice.

In the case of Fujitsu Voice, the ability to take a case to the CAC has helped apply pressure to Fujitsu when employee representatives have used the internal dispute resolution process. Notable examples of disputes that were resolved in the employees favour include the Redundancy Framework Agreement, Data Protection Fair Processing, Market Reference Salary information, and the ACAS-brokered agreement on offshoring consultation.

Without the potential to seek legal redress, it is highly unlikely these internal disputes would have been settled in employees' favour.

Q - What will happen to Fujitsu Voice and why don't we fight to save it instead of triggering the process to negotiate a new agreement?

A - Fujitsu Voice will continue to exist (and remain legally enforceable) until 14th January 2017. The Elected Representatives asked Fujitsu to rescind the termination notice and the company refused.

There is no legal mechanism employees can use to compel Fujitsu to rescind the termination notice. Now the internal dispute process has run its course, the best course of action employees and their representatives is to trigger the process to establish a new agreement, minimising the period employees are without UK information and consultation rights.

Q - What will happen to the Redundancy Framework Agreement?

A - It will terminate along with the Fujitsu Voice Charter, leaving employees without union recognition with significantly weakened redundancy rights.

Whether or not the new body undertakes redundancy consultation on behalf of employees without trade union recognition will be a matter for the negotiating representatives to grapple with. Unless employees have union recognition, the law allows an employer to choose how it consults over collective redundancies.

Q - Will the new agreement be the same as Fujitsu Voice?

A - At this stage it is not possible to determine the final outcome of the process (which hasn't even started).

The topics, scope and responsibilities of the new information and consultation body will be determined as part of the negotiations conducted between the company and the negotiating representatives.

Throughout the process, UNITE will campaign for an agreement that provides for staff in the UK to be consulted meaningfully and gives the elected representatives the facilities they need to do the job.

Q - What happens if the special negotiating body fails to reach agreement with the company?

A - There are two possible outcomes,

1. A majority of negotiating reps agree with the company to extend the negotiation period, OR
2. The Standard Provisions for information and consultation will apply.
   Details of what topics and scope are covered by the standard provisions can be found here. They are much weaker than Fujitsu Voice.

Q - What is the process and approximate timescale for establishing a new body?

A - A brief outline of the process is as follows

1. An Employee Request is made or an Employer Notification is issued to start the process of establishing a new I&C Body for UK Staff
2. Once the Employee Request has been accepted by the CAC, OR after an Employer Notification has been issued, there is a three month period to elect negotiating representatives from amongst employees.
3. At the end of this three month period, a six month period will commence for negotiating representatives and management to conclude a new negotiated agreement under the ICE Regulations 2004.
4. Should agreement not be reached within the six month period for negotiations, it can be extended by mutual agreement between the company and a majority of the negotiating representatives. If this does not happen, the Standard Provisions for Information and Consultation under the ICE regulations will apply.
5. Elections for Employee Representatives would then be required either under the terms of a negotiated agreement (if one is in place) or within at least a further six months following the end of the negotiation period. In the latter instance, employee representatives would be elected under the Standard Provisions.
6. The legal requirement to inform and consult employees at a UK level would then be restored.