All Members Circular - FBU accused of misleading - You decide!

TO:       ALLMEMBERS

 

Dear Brother/Sister,

FBU accused of misleading – You decide!

You may be aware that the RFU issued a note on 5 August which criticised the FBU and accused us of presenting misleading information with a view to obtaining support for potential strike action.

While we are not going to get involved in a tit for tat exchange, especially with an organisation that consistently proves itself totally irrelevant and insignificant; we cannot ignore the accusations that we have presented an inaccurate picture of the situation.

If the RFU wishes to promote or accept the government’s proposals that is its own business but we have made it quite clear throughout our campaign that these attacks will make your pension scheme unworkable, unaffordable and unfair.

We have, over a lengthy period of time, presented a significant amount of supporting evidence to substantiate our claims. All this evidence has been made available to members and is still available on the FBU website www.fbu.org.uk

Other organisations, including the RFU, have presented little or no evidence or opposition to the government’s proposals. On the contrary, it seems that the RFU is now accepting these proposals. Proposals which have already increased the cost of your pension, reduced the value of your benefits and have imposed an unworkable normal pension age. Once again they seem to be content to ride on the back of the work we are doing on behalf of retained firefighters.

The RFU is claiming the capability and ‘no job no pension’ argument we are progressing is ‘complete nonsense’. This statement unsurprisingly echoes the view of the English Fire Minister but unfortunately shows a complete lack of understanding of the situation we are facing. All the evidence shows that the no job no pension issue is a real one and cannot be swept under the carpet as some people would like.

The threat of capability or no job no pension is not something we have just invented to gain support for our campaign; it is a real threat that is with us now. The RFU note includes quotes from the report that Dr Williams produced to try and convince people but again, in line with the Fire Minister, they choose to pick and present the best case scenario and ignore the actual findings of the report.

It is worth reminding ourselves of what Dr Williams wrote in his report.

 “Recent data collected from four FRSs found at 50-54 years of age, 51% (n=417/822) of firefighters were below 42mL.kg.min. At 55-60 years,66% (n=70/106) of firefighters were below this minimum standard.”[1]

This couldn’t be any clearer. It shows that the best case scenario that the Fire Minister and the RFU would like to say is reflective of the actual position is hopelessly wide of the mark. Dr Williams admits that when actual firefighters were tested at the ages identified the levels of fitness are much different to the best case scenario assumptions. It shows that 70 of the 106 that were tested were below the recommended minimum standard.

When we report these findings we are not misleading you in any way. On the contrary we are presenting the facts as reported by the chair of the review, who was appointed by the government.

If there is any misleading at all it is being done by those who are trying to claim that everything in the garden is rosy when the actual results show something completely different.

Is our concern about capability nonsense?

To answer this it is worth quoting Dr Williams’ report again. In the section of his report about leaving for medical reasons Dr Williams wrote about ill health retirement rates and the criteria for qualifying for an ill health pension. In relation to those who could not continue on the grounds of loss of fitness but did not qualify for an ill health pension he wrote.

“Not all firefighters meet the criteria, so significant numbers will be in a position where they can no longer cope, often through loss of fitness, but the only option is to leave or have their contracted terminated on capability grounds without early payment of pension.”[2]

Again the government’s own expert, Dr Williams, was clear. Significant numbers won’t be able to cope because of failing fitness and will have to leave or face a capability dismissal without immediate access to their pension. The earlier quote showed what this significant number might be when it showed that 66% of current firefighters age 55-60 are below the recommended minimum standard.

Once again we are accurately reporting the findings of the report and the evidence we have also collected to illustrate that capability and the threat of no job no pension is real. If there is any misleading going on it is definitely not by us.

As expected the Fire Minister is trying to play down this threat by saying that he won’t be applying national fitness standards that firefighters have to pass or fail. He is suggesting that by him not setting a national standard there will be no problem. It seems that the RFU is convinced by this.

In reality however, the Fire Minister’s statement only makes the situation worse. By doing this he is not avoiding the threat of capability dismissals he is simply saying local managers can decide their own fitness levels.

His suggestion is that, although we all work to national rolemaps and we are all expected to work to an imposed national normal pension age, your fitness for role is something that can be decided locally.

This totally ignores the recommendation from Dr Williams that it is essential to determine role-related fitness standard(s) across the UK FRSs.

Far from removing the threat of capability, the Fire Minister’s statement makes it worse. Many FRAs already have fitness policies that require firefighters to pass or fail with the threat of capability dismissals included. The Fire Minister hasn’t said that there will be no capability dismissals where firefighters cannot maintain fitness he is just passing the buck and expecting local managers to do his dirty work.

Other organisations may be content with this but we certainly are not.

Is this actually going to happen or are we making a fuss over nothing?

Actual figures show that significant numbers of firefighters will face this threat. These are figures that have been presented by the government’s own experts.

The Williams report highlights that. 

“There will be a significant number of firefighters who expected to retire at age 55 and will have difficulty maintaining fitness beyond this age.”[3]

And that;

“There is likely to be a substantially larger proportion of women firefighters who are physically or medically unfit over age 55”[4]

Using capability measures in cases where firefighters simply cannot maintain operational fitness is already on the increase in some FRSs.  In addition to this we have raised another related issue that is much more commonplace amongst retained firefighters. We know that some retained fighters are forced to resign or leave when they cannot maintain their operational fitness. We also know that some choose to leave rather than face the indignity or stress of failing fitness tests. This is something that you may have personally witnessed. These firefighters have already faced the no job no pension situation simply for getting older and being unable to maintain their operational fitness. Again this was something that Dr Williams warned government about and gave the options – leave or face the sack.

So in answering the question; is this going to happen or are we making a fuss about nothing, we have to recognise that it is already happening. In fact all the evidence and experts indicate that it will be the case for a significant number of current firefighters. If government and the RFU wish to ignore the facts and base their views on best case scenarios that is their choice but we know what could be around the corner and we are determined to protect FBU members against the no job no pension scenario. 

We are the only organisation that is committed to defending your pension. However, despite our best attempts over the length of our campaign to reach a negotiated settlement we are still faced with a proposal for your pension which is unacceptable. The proposed deadline set by the English Fire Minister meant that our options were severely limited and resulted in us having to initiate a ballot for strike action.

This process ends on 29 August and you should have received your ballot paper by now. Please make sure you participate in this ballot and Vote Yes to allow us to continue to defend your pension. 

Many retained firefighters have recently been given another reason to support this campaign. Consultation has started on the legislation to introduce the long awaited modified scheme. Circular 2013HOC0458MWwas issued on 14 August giving details of why this is another scheme worth defending. Please take the time to read this circular which is also available on the FBU website.

All FBU members have a part to play in this latest campaign. The FBU has presented accurate information on the pension attacks and the potential problems that they will cause.

We will not bury our heads in the sand and ignore the problems and accept hollow promises and assurances about your pension.

This is a fight that we must take up and a fight that will need us all to be involved in.

Please make sure you and your colleagues take part in the ballot and make sure that you Vote Yes.

Yours in Unity,

 

SEANSTARBUCK
National Officer