ANALYSIS: Youth Service - Is it the time for strike action?

Are these really the darkest days the youth service sector has seen in 42 years?

Doug Nicholls thinks they might be. As general secretary of the Community and Youth Workers' Union, Nicholls last week warned that a ballot over strike action could result if employers - the local authorities - do not alter their stance on pay and conditions (YPN, 29 October-4 November, p2).

This isn't comparable with other public sector professions such as teaching: a strike of youth workers on a national scale has never happened. But as Nicholls says: "There's more concern about this issue than I've ever seen before." The Joint Negotiating Committee for Youth and Community Workers (JNC) has always reached "an amicable" agreement over pay and conditions since its launch in 1961, in the wake of the Albemarle Report, he says.

The offer from employers of three per cent - which amounts to 20p an hour for most part-time staff and 43p an hour for someone at the top of JNC level three - is an "insult", says Nicholls.

This isn't greed on the part of the union, he stresses. It's a question of pay scales making it impossible for youth services to deliver the Government's targets as outlined in Transforming Youth Work: "We want them to propose sensible pay ranges with higher starting points and less overlapping," he says.

A further problem is the qualification level for the profession, which Nicholls fears is being set too low: "Workforce development proposals are looking at weakening the level of qualifications necessary to do our work."

Recruitment and retention are at the heart of this dispute, as they have been in other public service sectors, such as nursing and social work.

These sectors, says Nicholls, improved their status and pay.

But this isn't recognised on the employers' side. A representative from the Employers' Organisation for Local Government points out that teachers accepted a 2.9 per cent increase in April.

The timing of the union's comments is interesting. The independent Pay Com- mission, set up in the wake of last year's council worker strike, looks at pay and rewards for local govern-ment employees. Published on 29 October, its report states that "the value of the total package" in local government is as good as, if not better than, that of other employees.

Commenting on the report, Charles Nolda, executive director of the Employ- ers' Organisation for Local Government, says his organisation will be "throwing its weight behind local councils in managing, training and developing their biggest resource to improve services and to recruit and retain the best".

Sir Jeremy Beecham, chair of the Local Government Association, says: "Local government is regarded as a reasonable employer in terms of pay, and local government pension schemes enhance employees' remuneration packages."

Unison is the biggest public service union in Britain, numbering youth workers and Connexions staff among its members. But it wasn't prepared to comment on the Community and Youth Workers' Union's stance when approached by YPN. Nor was anyone available from the Association of Principal Youth and Community Officers.

At the Employers' Organisation for Local Government, representing the employers' side of negotiations, no-one could add to last week's comments by a representative that youth work wasn't viewed as a "special case" and that the offer of three per cent was in line with what teachers accepted in the spring.

Nicholls also has some carefully chosen words about The National Youth Agency's Workforce Development Plan, which he describes as "lacking in ambition and the clarity that equivalent workforce development papers have had".

Tom Wylie, chief executive of the agency, argues that the plan, if implemented properly, would "move the whole sector forward quite dramatically".

Wylie describes strike action as "a blunt instrument".

Pretty much the only area of consensus across the board is that recruitment and retention is a major problem.

And this lies at the heart of the dispute, stresses Nicholls: "Any other sector that has found a recruitment and retention crisis has revised its pay and status."

All youth workers are invited to attend a conference, Short-Changing Young People, Short-Changing Youth Workers, on Saturday 8 November in Birmingham. www.cywu.org.uk

CYWU DEMANDS

What the Community and Youth Workers' Union wants:

- A "significant" pay increase

- NVQ Level Three equivalent as the minimum qualification level for entry into paid employment in the sector

- A "meaningful" national framework of provision and grading criteria

- All qualifications being "properly validated" by JNC-recognised committees

- Shorter pay scales with fewer points at the bottom and less overlap.