Level 5 Intermediate Diploma in Human Resource

Management
5HR01 Employment relationship management
Week 4
Learning Outcomes

On completion of this unit, you will:

1.
2.
Understand employee voice,
engagement and practices to Understand different forms of
support better working lives conflict behaviour and
dispute resolution

3. 4.
Understand how to manage Understand the role of
performance, disciplinary and employee bodies in the
grievance matters lawfully. employment relations.
Learning Outcome 4
Understand the role of employee bodies in employment relations.
4.1 Explain the main provisions of collective employment law
Types of regulation

Legal regulation
EC treaties & directives
Broadly speaking the employment UK statutes
relationship is regulated by both Statutory codes of practice
voluntary and legal measures.
UK common law of :
a. Contract
b. tort
Legal rights - Trade Union Membership

• In the UK, Employees have a right to belong to an independent trade union of

their choice, and to refuse to belong to a staff association which is not
independent. While employees may be union members, the company has no
legal obligation to recognise the trade union unless it so wishes.
Trade Union Membership

• TULRCA 1992 – outlines the freedom to be a member or non-member of a Trade

Union
• HRA 1998 – Freedom of Association – Art 11
• 2019 6.44m members in UK (23.55 of all employees) ( 1979 – 13.2 m)
• Public Sector – 58.5% of members
• Females are 57% of total membership ( Education, Care, Health, Govt)
• Change due to decline in manufacturing, growth in non-union sectors, more
women at work, growth in sectors (above)
• UNITE 1.42m, UNISON 1.3m
Employment Law

• Employment Rights Act 1996

• Data Protection Act 1998
• Working Time Regulations 1998
• National Minimum Wage 1998
• National Living wage 2016
• Equality Act 2010
• Flexible Working Regulations 2014
• Employment Act 2008
• The Employment Act 2002
• The Employment Dispute Resolution Act 2002
• Employment relations Act 1999
• Employment Rights Act 2004
• Repeal of retirement Age provisions 2011
The Employment Act 2008 – Disciplinary &
Grievance Procedures

• The Employment Act 2008 came into force in April 2009,

removing the minimum statutory Disciplinary & Grievance
Procedures. These were replaced with the new ACAS code
of practice on Disciplinary & Grievance Procedures (the
‘ACAS Code’). 

Unlike the statutory procedures, the Code is not legally

binding. However, the principles of the Code are
essentially the same and will be considered by a Tribunal
when deciding the fairness of a dismissal and the levels of
compensation to be awarded. 

• The ACAS Code of Practice

ACAS code of practice

What are the main

principles of the ACAS code
of practice?
Equality Act 2010

• Interpretation of ( Age, Disability, Gender..?)

• Employment Equality; It can be lawful to dismiss at a Company
set retirement age, provided a fair procedure is followed
• An employer must be able to objectively justify a retirement
age. There is no statutory one although consider when State
Pension is payable
• This is an area of justifiable direct / indirect discrimination as
long as it is viewed as a “proportionate means of achieving a
legitimate outcome”
• Unfair dismissal has no upper age limit
Employment law

Employees can request to work beyond employer justified retirement age.

Employers must give such requests serious consideration, although they are not obliged to grant them, or even provide
a reason for refusing. They can refuse (even early retirement)
Core considerations
• Real business need
• Appropriate and necessary
• Proportionate

Reasons can include

• Succession Planning
• Opening opportunities
• Intergenerational fairness
• Congenial environment

Procedures
• Grievance
• Dismissal
• Requests
Exercise

A line manager comes to you to discuss a

problem he perceives with a worker who is
aged 66.

He is reporting that some of his skill sets are

not up to the job particularly his speed of
working.

You ask about his background and the

manager reports that this person has always
been a good and steady worker with a long
and reliable history with the company.

What is your course of action?

Taking official action

• Industrial action is treated as "official" if the 

trade union whose members are taking part has
endorsed or authorised it and has not subsequently
repudiated it. Where members of more than one
union are taking part, all unions must authorise or
endorse it, otherwise the members of the union
that has not authorised or endorsed it will be
involved in unofficial action. If none of the 
employees taking part are members of any union,
the action is neither official nor unofficial, but the
employees have the same unfair dismissal rights as
they would during official action.

Source: https://www.gov.uk/industrial-action-strikes
Learning Outcome 4
Understand the role of employee bodies in employment relations.
4.2 Compare the types of employee bodies, union and non-union forms of
employee representation.
Employee bodies

• CIPD – advice and guidance on employment

law and employee relations
• SHRM – Code of Ethics: As human resource
professionals, we are ethically responsible
for promoting and fostering fairness and
justice for all employees and their
organizations.
• Acas – Mission: devoted to improving
organisations and working life through
better employment relations.
• Case Law – reported decisions of courts -
how the law is applied in real life
• TUC – Trade Union Congress
Employee bodies

• ACAS has the general duty of improving industrial relations and provides advice, individual and
collective conciliation and arbitration services.
• Provide advice, develop codes of practice, training, surveys etc
• The Certification Officer maintains lists of employers’ associations and trade unions, and issues
certificates of independence.
• The Central Arbitration Committee deals with Collective bargaining issues.
• Legislation sometimes allows for a Minister or a statutory body to issue Codes of Practice
(Subordinate).
• Codes are not law, just advice subject to SoS approval – breach is taken into account in an Tribunal.

• Trade Union and Labour Relations Consolidation Act 1992

• Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013 (early resolution)
• http://www.acas.org.uk/
Forms of representation

• Joint negotiation committees

• Employee forums
• Staff councils
• Works councils

https://www.cipd.co.uk/knowledge/fundamentals/relations/communication/voice-factsheet
Exercise: forms of representation

What types of representation do you

have in your workplace?

In groups, create a list different forms

of representation you have in your
organisations.

What pros and cons do each of these

methods have?

Think about how we need to

encourage voice, motivation and
participation in the workplace.
Break (30 minutes)
Learning Outcome 4
Understand the role of employee bodies in employment relations.
4.3 Evaluate the purpose of collective bargaining and how it works..
Purpose of collective bargaining

There are two main purposes of collective bargaining:

• To regulate terms and conditions of employment to
ensure fairness and consistency of application

• An avenue for the resolution of disputes - Collective

bargaining would not take place if the employer and
employee did not share common interests and have
to work together in order to produce goods and
services. Both the parties to the labour relationship
have the organisations well being and profitability at
heart, and for this to take place, the parties are forced
to sort out their differences.
(Basson et al, 2003;57)
Distributive bargaining

• This form of bargaining is associated with the typical bargaining positions

between management and unions.
• It takes place when the two parties' interests are in conflict.
• It involves the two parties making proposals, counterproposals and compromises.
• Integrative bargaining: This form of bargaining occurs when there is a common
problem at the workplace. The involved parties work together to define the
problem, analyse it, gather, exchange and explore information and creative
solutions.
The process

• Collective bargaining is a process in the sense that it consist of a number of steps

it begins with presentation of the charter of demand and ends with reaching an
agreement which would serve as the basic law governing labour management
relations over a period of time in any expertise.

• Moreover, it is a flexible process and not fixed or static but mutual trust and
understanding serve as the products of harmonious relations between the two
parties.
How it is done

• The first negotiating session is generally an extremely important occasion in that

the climate for bargaining is set, the bargaining boundaries established, offers
and demands justified and manipulative attempts are made to influence the
expectations of the other party.

• Signalling. After both parties have presented their demands and debated their
positions, they begin to signal one another on the areas in which they are
prepared to move. Proposing. After the signalling phase, cautious proposals begin
to emerge. These proposals must be treated with respect and their clearness
must be established and written down.
How it is done

• Packaging.
• This phase is very important because this is where the proposals are integrated
and shaped by the parties into packages that are acceptable to one another.

• Closing the agreement:

• The power reality between the parties will have to be carefully assessed at this
point. For example, are union tactics seen as sufficiently disruptive or
unreasonable that an employer feels that, irrespective of the cost in terms of lost
production and damaged relationships;
Negotiation exercise

The management team are putting

forward a contract change to encompass
online working and this includes terms
and conditions which have gone to
consultation with the staff group and been
rejected.

The purpose of the bargaining now is to

find a way forward both parties can agree
on.
Purpose of collective bargaining

OECD; the
way bargaining
can help
workers
Objectives of bargaining

• The setting of working conditions and

other matters of mutual interest
between employer and employees in a
structured, institutionalized
environment.
• Conformity and predictability through
the creation of common substantive
conditions and procedural rules of
engagement for parties involved.
• The promotion of workplace democracy
and employee participation in
managerial decision making.
Future of bargaining

Advantages of bargaining
and how it can help the
UK economy for more
reading
Advantages of collective bargaining

• Collective bargaining hopes to improve relations

between workers and the union on the one hand and
the employer on the other.
• Collective bargaining is a continuous process it enables
industrial democracy to be effective. It uses cooperation
and consensus for settling disputes rather than conflict
and confrontation.
• It acts as a method of introducing level rights in the
industry, that is, the management should be conducted
by rules and rather that arbitrary decision making.
• It establishes rules, which defines and restrict the
traditional authority exercised by the management.

Source: https://www.slideshare.net/JoeOgar/focused-collective-bargaining-during-recession
Debate exercise

GROUP 1 GROUP 2

The reduction in Unions and

It is important for workplaces to
collective bargaining has resulted in
remain productive and so it is
more conflict and this negatively
necessary to remove Union power
affects the workplace and
in order to ensure the full effort of
productivity and so we need to
the workers.
reverse this trend.
Learning Outcomes

1.
2.
Understand employee voice,
engagement and practices to Understand different forms of
support better working lives. conflict behaviour and dispute
resolution

3. 4.
Understand how to manage Understand the role of
performance, disciplinary and employee bodies in the
grievance matters lawfully. employment relations.
Finish