Doug Beattie MC MLA, the Ulster Unionist Party’s Justice spokesperson, has expressed his concern that nearly twelve months after negotiations started with the Northern Ireland Prison Service in respect of their 2016 pay award, talks have still not been completed and no award agreed or implemented.
Doug Beattie MC said:
“In January of this year, later than normal due to unforeseen circumstances, negotiations began for the annual pay award for the Northern Ireland Prison Service (NIPS) in order that agreement could be reached and the award implemented by April 2016. However, the negotiations between the Prison Officers Association (POA), the Prison Service Management Board and the Department of Justice (DoJ) have yet to be completed, agreed and implemented. The stumbling block remains issues that were first agreed as part of the ‘Staff Deployment Agreement’ in 2014 and by the Director General of the NIPS in June 2016.
“These agreements set out the pay and conditions for prison officers as part of prison reform, and their lack of implementation has created low morale amongst officers and a low expectation that they will be in a Prison Service that is valued in the future.
“The latest round of talks – which have been ongoing since early January 2016 - ask for the implementation of that agreement, which includes reducing a working week from 39 hours per week to 37, agreeing an overtime rate which is presently a flat pay rate, as well as reducing the incremental pay increase rate from seven years to five. This incremental pay increase rate would mean that a Custody Prison Officer (CPO) enlisted on £18k per year will be able to achieve their top rate of pay of £26k per year within five years instead of seven. A modest ask given the rate of pay for many within the service, but an important ask in order to assist retention within the service.
“One of the more contentious issues is that of ‘Risk Pay’ or environmental pay for those who try to minimise the risks faced by prison officers. At present, Officers employed post 2000, CPOs, Night Custody Officers (NCO) and other grades, receive £2k per year in relation to the risks they take both in and out of their normal working environment. This is approximately half of what the Police Service receive yet it was agreed that a single flat rate of £3,162 would be appropriate for grades employed post 2000. This was also agreed in June 2016 by the Director General Sue McAllister and yet again, it is still to be implemented.
“The First Minister is aware of these issues which were presented to her and her Junior Minister Alastair Ross MLA by the POA at a meeting on 10th October 2016. Therefore, I shall be seeking clarification of the situation in the coming days from both the DoJ and the Prison Service Management Board and attempt to ascertain if they are meeting resistance from the Minister for Finance in implementing these agreed measures.
“The Prison Service and the POA find themselves in an impossible position. They demand their officers be valued for the difficult and dangerous work they do and they strive to implement prison reform. They feel abandoned by the Executive, and neglected by a society who view them purely as prison wardens. The removing of their labour for ninety minutes on Friday 4th November in order to hold a meeting might seem futile, but it is all they can do to highlight the position they find themselves in.
“As an elected representative, a member of the Justice Committee and someone who thinks highly of the prison service, I find it completely unacceptable that as negotiations for the NIPS pay award for 2017 should be starting, the pay awards for 2016 have not been agreed or acknowledged.
"This is another clear example of how our Executive - supposedly no longer working in silos - does not value the work of our Prison Service and a shameful example of intransigence on behalf of the DoJ in delivering a sustainable prison service and prison regime.”