Arcnews 78 aug/sept 2015

“The current system favours competence collectors and those good at sell­ing themselves.”

Neil McFarlane, AGM—11

“Talk to your colleagues about this, tell them that our cleaners don’t get the living wage, tell them that a lot of our cleaners in our buildings have to work seven days a week, and work split shifts.”

“The fifth largest city in the UK could potentially be left with­out any HMRC presence.”

David Cooper, AGM—33

Bernie Smith, AGM—32

ISSUE 78 | AUG/SEPT 2015

STEPPING UP TO THE MIKE AGM SPECIAL ISSUE

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EDITORIAL

WILL RICHARDSON

ARC

, like our parent union the FDA, is entirely non-party political (our political fund is an insurance policy rather than, as with many other unions, a conduit for party contributions). Nonetheless, it is impossible to ignore the startling outcome of the Labour leadership election, if only because, as a civil service union, we need some kind of relationship with shadow ministers as well as those in office.

Jeremy Corbyn went from a derided outsider, whose presence on the ballot was only due to charity nominations from MPs who wanted all views represented, to hot favourite. In the final days the only speculation was about the size of the margin and how many rounds of the alternative voting system it would take. I was only mildly surprised to hear that he had won on the first round. There are lessons in this for everyone, ARC included. We are reminded once again how quickly things can change in the political world. The pundits who apparently thought – with more than a hint of national stereotyping - that radical left insurgencies were a matter for excitable Mediterraneans, rather than we Northern Europeans, have been confounded. And for ARC there is the interesting prospect of a parliament in which government and opposition attitudes to taxation, public spending, deficit reduction and the role of the state will be radically different rather than debates about the nuances of a fundamental consensus. There will be a clear disagreement about whether such services as railways and utilities should be private or public, not just about how the contract should be administered.

Both parties will desperately need an efficient HMRC, one to bring in enough money to ease the pain of austerity and preserve voter acquiescence and the other to tilt the balance of contributions towards the better-off and away from the poorest. Up to now all three major parties, with differences of emphasis, have been looking at the left-hand side of the national profit and loss account. Suddenly we have one party looking far more closely at the right-hand side. ARC, I assume, will continue to seek open channels of communication with all parties, but for the rest of this parliament we will be addressing a much wider spectrum than hitherto.

Welcome to the somewhat delayed August/September issue of arcnews, with full reports of the 2015 AGM. This is your chance, of you weren’t present in May, to see what Centres had to say about ARC’s policy on the issues of greatest importance to members, whether it be pay, terms and condition, trainee matters, PMR, you name it. For most members this is the best chance to form a judgement about those activists who may be seeking your vote come the next Committee elections and I hope you seize it and use it well.

As ever, I’d like to know what you think, about arcnews generally, this issue in particular and, especially, how we report the AGM. Too much detail? Too little? Let me know at the usual address.

Will Richardson Editor

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arcnews

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CAPTION COMPETITION THIS ISSUE

The picture shows Jonathan Donovan, head of employee relations with Graham Flew in the background. But what might either of them be saying or thinking? Entries to arcnewseditor@gmail.com by 31 October please. is published by the Association of Revenue and Customs (ARC) 8 Leake Street, London SE1 7NN www.twitter.com/arc_union Tony Wallace, President: 020 7401 5559 President’s Secretary: 020 7401 5573 Fax: 020 7401 5552 Membership: 020 7401 5590 membership@fda.org.uk Editor: Will Richardson arcnewseditor@gmail.com Mobile: 07973 895887 Deputy Editors: Julie Blayney Steve McFarlane Design & Production: www.lexographic.co.uk Advertising and classifieds: Simon Briant SDB Marketing 01273 594455 simon@sdbmarketing.co.uk Printing: Warners Midlands PLC The Maltings Manor Lane Bourne Lincolnshire PE10 9PH

ARCNEWS 77

Congratulations to Jim Samson for his snappy reference to the Hit Parade.

ARC’S TAKE THAT TRIBUTE BAND SING “EVERYTHING CHANGES”

The views expressed in arcnews are not necessarily the views of the editor or the union. arcnews is printed on environmentally-friendly paper produced from sustainable forests and wrapped in biodegradable polywrap.

Please recycle after you have finished reading this magazine.

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Letters

Letters on all topics are welcome. We may edit letters for sense and syntax; please email them to arcnewseditor@ gmail.com and mark them clearly for publication or write to ARC, 8 Leake Street, London SE1 7NN.

ARC FORUM

Join the debate Visit arc-forum.org and join the debate. It’s a members-only site and you will need to register the first time you visit.

Registration is simple, but if you are new to forums, you can email the forum administrator at graham@fda.org.uk and Graham

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Flew will provide a “help card” to explain how the forum works.

The forum is a useful place to read about things happening in the union, and also to pass on your views. And you will be able to catch up on the latest by reading Tony’s President’s Blog.

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WELL MET Tony Wallace RETURNS FROM THE AGM

W

elcome to this year’s AGM special.

As always, we covered a huge amount of ground this year with motions on; pay, engagement, PMR, Building our Future, careers and trainees among others. You can read the debates and decisions elsewhere this month, but I got the opportunity to make two little bits of history of my own. I cast the only chairman’s casting vote that I, and I think anyone else, can remember and I also managed to finish AGM an hour earlier than usual. Whilst I would love to take the credit for the early finish, I didn’t do it alone. It was down to the goodwill, discipline and forbearance of our representatives and I would just like to thank those of you who were there for making my first AGM the outstandarcnews

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ing success that it was.

Throughout my career, in fact throughout my life, I have always tried to keep the simple maxim “Prepare for every eventuality but expect the unexpected” in mind. It is easy to get blasé after a while in most jobs but one of the many great things about my day job in tax investigation is that you genuinely do not know what is around the corner. You

often think you know the answer; you are regularly disabused of that.

So to AGM, I had everything covered; I had read the procedures, I had the rules, I studied Citrine. The motions? I knew them backward.

Nothing could knock me off my stride. One hour in and everything was going smoothly and then – a motion on whether managers should or should not have greater input into

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<<

“Much to my surprise it was a dead heat!

I have lost count of the number of conferences I have attended but I have never before seen a tie.”

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LEAD STORY FIRST

job applications; pretty mundane. To be honest though, I was not sure what way I would vote on this, so I thought; go with the flow and listen to the debate. I called the mover and two or three other speakers; nobody spoke against the proposition, the closest we came to an opponent was Sarah Guerra who raised concerns about diversity issues. I moved to a vote – much to my surprise it was a dead heat!

I have lost count of the number of conferences I have attended but I have never before seen a tie, what was particularly surprising about this one was that there had been no debate. Neither have I seen a chairman use a casting vote; it’s rare but it happens, just not in my experience. The convention is to vote with the status quo; I followed convention and the motion was lost. ARC policy is not to call for greater managers input into the job application process.

Ok this was perhaps not the most exciting story I have ever shared but it was an odd little moment and a genuine surprise to many in the room. A resolution which, on the face of it was not controversial was ultimately lost. I must say that I am not comfortable with this; if a democratic process is to work as intended then there should on an occasion like this have been a debate. There was no debate but a decision was reached. Was it the right one? On the one hand it was; the purpose of the rules of AGM and of chairmanship is to allow for a conclusion to be reached whatever the circumstances, the rules worked and a decision was reached. But, without having heard the reasoning of the half of the room who voted against a proposition upon which I found myself undecided, on this occasion I really don’t know. What I do know is arcnews

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that you cannot take opinion for granted. We really do need to capture the voice of all of our members in whichever way we can; those that you can hear and those, who despite holding strong views, choose to hold them quietly. How do we do that?

Can we do that? What are the channels to allow us to address those things? I throw these statements out there I have many ideas but I do not have a clear answer.

We organise meetings, we speak to as many of you as we can, we survey you periodically, we have two regular publications and we have ARC Forum. These are all useful methods of capturing opinion but every method we use requires an element of self-selection on the part of the end user to engage. The key to an organisation such as ours is that we must try to better capture that collective voice in every way that we can. ARC members are a thoughtful and considerative body of people not always given to making a lot of noise. But strong opinions quietly held must not be ignored. For that principle reason we are developing a number of new ways of communicating with you. The Information ARC has now bedded down and the feedback we are getting for those bite size pieces of information is really good. But we want to do a whole lot better. In next month’s arcnews we will be starting a new regulate update piece where we will be reporting back on the resolutions which have been passed this year.

All on Committee have been asked to take charge of the delivery of specific areas of the work that you have tasked us to undertake and each we will be telling you how we have delivered on that. On top of that we have now completed our tendering exercise for arcnews and our new website. We will be pressing ahead

with its production and will be using it to host a new updated version of the Forum. Finally, and perhaps most radically we are now looking at ways to change the nature of AGM itself.

A London-based AGM becomes ever more expensive and in that context we believe that we should be obtaining the best value for money that we can for you, our members.

But more important than that; we believe that we, as a union, should be a national and less London centric organisation, taking our AGM out to you our members is one real tangible way of demonstrating that.

We may even be pathfinders for our employer. We are currently considering a number of venues outside of the capital on university campuses around the country which are large enough to accommodate the numbers we need for AGM and Dinner.

This is a big undertaking and we are making sure that we get things right.

We have so far considered and obtained quotes from, Loughborough, Nottingham, Warwick and York universities and are now in the process of visiting each to gauge the facilities available.

We will see how it goes next year and how it works.

Finally, in the spirit of change I would also like to spare a few paragraphs to cover the momentous decisions taken at this year’s FDA ADC. After perhaps the best debate I have ever had the pleasure to have heard and taken part in we took the historic decision to open up our rules to allow us to extend membership of FDA to HO and SO colleagues (see “Introducing Keystone” on page 10).

This has been a long time coming but it is my fervent belief, supported by the almost unanimous view of conference, that there is much that

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â&#x20AC;&#x153;We have so far considered and obtained quotes from; Loughborough, Nottingham, Warwick and York universities.â&#x20AC;? a union such as ours can offer to colleagues who share a similar outlook in terms of their relationship with their employer and of the advantage that a progressive trade union can bring to their working lives. We will attract new members from a constituency of people who do not feel an affinity with other existing unions and who, as a consequence, are not currently a member of any.

What we are offering is right both for our current members and for those that will join us. In designing a structure attractive to new colleagues we have also been careful not to unbalance the excellent service that our existing ARC and FDA members have long enjoyed.

FDA is a federal organisation; in some areas such as in HMRC, we are organised around a single employer. In others we are organised by reference to professional groups across a number of departments. What all of our constituencies have in common is a strong identity with their colleagues. We in ARC are a large and distinct group within FDA and associate primarily with others of us in HMRC but we are by no means unique in that outlook. Our new colleagues, whilst sharing our broader world view, have issues that are unique to them as a group and that is why it is essential that they too have their own strong and distinct identity within FDA. Our new HO/SO section organised right across the civil service will provide the strong identity in a strong section within a strong FDA that has served us so well in the past.

I know that you will all join me in welcoming our new colleagues to our union

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SPECIAL SUPPLEMENT

2015 Annual General Meeting

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2015 Annual General Meeting

Full coverage of the motions, the debates, the dinner and the speeches.

Photos by Jonathan Gardiner.

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KEYNOTE: Dave Penman, FDA general Secretary......................4

RECEPTION AND DINNER PHOTOS: ...................... 26

KEYNOTE: Tony Wallace, ARC President......................................8

CONFERENCE VIRGINS: Ross Starkie & Stewart McKie ................................ 26

KEYNOTE: Grace Stevens, Director of Group Tax, Legal and General.......................................................18

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KEYNOTE: Bernadette Smith, Legal and Governance........... 32 MOTIONS:................................................................... 5-35

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2015 Annual General Meeting

KEYNOTE ADDRESS

Dave Penman FDA GENERAL SECRETARY

P

resident, Conference, once again it gives me great pleasure to be addressing ARC AGM, not – as I once was, the jumped-up hired-help lightswitcher that Rob [O’Neill] is, actually he’s the interim light switcher – but, of course, as your General Secretary. And I bring with me the best wishes of the FDA’s Executive Committee and I hope you have a progressive conference. And I’ve also been asked to pass on the gratitude from all the staff at FDA HQ for the gift of Tony Wallace as a work colleague. Already feeling lucky to have one boy from Cumbernauld amongst them, I’m told they feel they’ve won the lottery to have two; and when we get chatting we could be passing state secrets as only one word in three

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is ever understood and that’s usually just the profanities.

But colleagues, we meet less than a week after the general election result, which had what seems to be the least likely of outcomes, so whether you celebrated on Friday, mourned or, perhaps, like me, contemplated a new career, we have to face up to the reality that a Conservative majority government – however small that majority is – not only has the electoral mandate to continue austerity but the votes to see it through unchecked.

And so, while analogies have been made with the Major government of 1992, on the key issues that affect our members – the broad economic plan for eliminating the deficit by 2017-18 – there is no doubt the government will be able to carry its will through parliament. And that, of course, raises huge challenges for the Civil Service and for our

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Domestic matters and rules

portant matters of the previous year’s AGM minutes, the Annual Report, the Financial Report and Accounts and Benevolent

Julie Blayney reports on the first set of motions.

union. But it’s not one that we are unprepared for.

We knew that whatever the outcome of the election, the Civil Service faced a further five years of budget cuts. Now over the last few years I’ve watched proudly as ARC particularly has made the case for investment and staffing in HMRC, with the healthy return that investment delivers for the taxpayer. Defeat the deficit was the inspiration for the FDA’s Delivering for the Nation campaign and you’ve continued that work, engaging with politicians and the broader tax community to make your case. You’ve also critically recognised that any argument for investment will only succeed if you’re trusted by the government, by parliament and the public to deliver results. You’ve been proud advocates for the professionalism of HMRC staff and have sought to raise the standard of debate, confronting and engaging with your fiercest critics.

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The beginning of the AGM is usually a familiar matter to old hands, the same half-dozen routine domestic motions are nodded through in a few minutes, dealing with the minutes of last year’s AGM, the Annual Report, the Financial Report and Accounts and three other Treasurer’s motions on the Benevolent Fund, the political fund (known to us as ‘the provisional sectional subscriptions’) and the beloved peppercorn. We’ve been threatening to abolish the peppercorn for years, but like the horse in the old Schedule E legislation it has hung on for longer than people expected.

For those who haven’t made it to an AGM yet, you should know that while things usually run very smoothly, this is not without a certain amount of organisation and many rules and regulations. Think of it like the proverbial swan gliding along looking calm and graceful while under the water the legs are flapping away. Before any motions are heard, Graham Flew gave his report as convenor of

Fund Accounts. Eugene Mitchell presented his first set of accounts that he had prepared as Treasurer, laying out some of the planned cost savings for the next year. We can be confident of his skill with numbers, as when our President tried to skip straight ahead to MOTION 6, he was quick to point out that five comes first!

Michelle Wyer was due to present the Benevolent Fund accounts, but thanks to train issues at Clapham Junction, Graham Flew stepped back up to the podium asking AGM to receive the accounts.

For the first “proper” motion of the day, it was Gareth Hills

the Procedures Sub-Committee.

The 12 amendments to motions (falsely) suggested we might struggle to get through the day without running over time.

The first few motions of the AGM are usually fairly similar to earlier years, passed through quickly, but dealt with the im-

representing Bristol Centre, moving MOTION 7 to “future proof” ARC by aligning it with FDA rules in one key area. As the rules previously stood, ARC members had a double charge if they wanted to be associates or life members of both ARC and FDA, something which didn’t happen

MOTIONS 1-9: DOMESTIC MATTERS AND RULES

MOTIONS 1-10:

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DAVE PENMAN (CONT)

2015 Annual General Meeting Those initiatives, before the election was ever known, were the groundwork for the task ahead.

But the Chancellor is already banking on five billion pounds in additional tax revenue; you’re in a strong position to argue your case – and support HMRC’s in theirs – in the spending round to come in June.

Now when I stood here last year you were in the midst of an industrial dispute. Now settled, you’ve shown – as the FDA did in the pensions dispute – that industrial action is a means to an end rather than an end in itself, and as such a settlement was reached with your employer and that employer understood that, however much they disagreed with the dispute, it was over issues that genuinely mattered to members and that, ultimately, ARC is a union that wants to reach a settlement and has its members’ interests at heart. Strong, pragmatic and honest. You should rightly be proud of your union, as am I as General Secretary. But those values will be sorely tested in the months and years to come . As we witnessed with the last spending round, whatever case is made for investment in HMRC it’s against a backdrop of spending cuts unseen for generations, and a government that unfortunately has shown an appetite for not only cutting staff but attacking the key elements of the reward package that are most valued by members.

We now have to make the case that, if the government wants another £13bn in spending cuts, it needs to think again about how it treats the very public servants who are expected to deliver those services and those savings. So tomorrow members and delegates will hear the FDA call for a new deal for Civil Servants from the new government. That will be the focus of a campaign over the coming weeks and months to persuade the government that it needs a new vision for the Civil Service. A vision where it values the work you do and respects your impartiality. Where it will invest in your skills and recognise that this takes time and money.

Where it will match the commitments it makes to the resources it provides and, critically, ensure that Civil Servants are compensated for all the hours they work. Where it ensures that the pay system, unreformed since the last Conservative majority government, is changed so that it delivers fair outcomes and will attract new talent. And, finally, where it will genuinely engage with Civil Servants, giving them an opportunity to shape the very public services that they deliver. New government, new

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deal will be our rallying call and ARC has a critical role to play in shaping the campaign over the coming months. And tomorrow the FDA annual conference will also debate one of the most important issues that it’s considered in its history. The Association of the First Division of Civil Servants, founded in 1919, was so called because the first division of the Civil Service was the name given to the top tier. And since then we have been a union that in the main started in grade 7. But that’s changing. Over 15% of our members are below grade 7. Some are fast streamers and trainees in HMRC, but we also cover all grades in the Foreign Office; in Culture, in Justice we represent grades equivalent to SEO and as a union we support the staff associations in the security services, again in all grades. So yes, James Bond is an FDA member.

So tomorrow we will debate rule changes that will potentially open up FDA membership to HEOs and SEOs or their equivalents and we’re doing so for three main reasons. Firstly, in 2011 and 2012 Conference passed motions instructing the Executive Committee to consider the feasibility of opening up membership to this group and, of course as you know, Executive Committees always does what it’s told. Secondly, as the Civil Service shrinks so our membership shrinks; we are now recruiting more members than we ever have done, but the fact is that our union has shrunk more than 12% over the last three years alone. That trend is

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only going to accelerate over the next five years and unless we do something this will have a devastating impact on the union’s finances and our ability to serve our members – and indeed our ability to operate as an independent union.

And thirdly, we know and you know that almost every day HEO and SEO staff approach us to join our union. In workplaces up and down the country they approach FDA and ARC reps and ask to join.

They contact FDA HQ and every time we organise a recruitment event they approach us and ask to join FDA. They are looking for that strong pragmatic and honest union I talked about earlier. But up till now they’ve had no option to join. And this is not about poaching members from other unions, it’s about offering choice to potential members who want to join our union. So, with the changes proposed, we’d open up membership, provide a strong but separate identity for the new members and, so crucially, also protect the identity of our union as a union for senior managers and professionals. Just as most members in this room identify themselves as ARC first, we need to ensure that this new group of members have their own distinct identity and voice so that they can have a say in the issues that affect them. That’s what will make this initiative a success and that’s what will also protect the brand and identity that’s currently held dear by existing FDA and ARC members.

Colleagues, the next five years is inevitably going to be difficult, possibly even more difficult than the last five. But I believe that unions are defined not by how they respond in good times but how they respond when times are tough. Members need to know we’re in their corner, campaigning on the issues that are important to them, negotiating to protect and advance their interests and, crucially, representing them when they need support.

Strong, pragmatic and honest: that’s what makes our union great. And if we stick to those values, that’s what will see us and our members through the tough times ahead. Thank you.

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this wasn’t too controversial.

Just a slight tweak to ensure the motion achieved the desired outcome. The motion passed as amended.

Graham Flew then moved MOTION 8 for Committee, keeping it brief in deference to those who are not filled with joy by Rules motions. Graham described the matter in question as simple-It asked if a member of ARC Committee who was seconded to another government department outside of HMRC was able to fully represent members and carry out their duties as a Committee member. There was recognition of a difficult balance- all ARC members are entitled to be a member of Committee, but all members deserve to be fully represented. The motion amended the rules so that any Committee member on a secondment of three months or more would cease to be a member of committee. Then we

had the amendment to the motion. The mover of the amendment (a shifty looking character called Graham Flew) said that the mover was wrong to call it a simple motion. The motion as originally worded affected some of the rules connected to it unintentionally, so the amendment resolved that issue. With everyone content that the amended motion was in order, the motion was passed. (Are you still following this? This is why AGM veterans are not necessarily fans of rules motions).

Spencer Munn represented Committee, moving MOTION 9.

MOTIONS 1-9: DOMESTIC MATTERS AND RULES

“We have to make the case that, if the government wants another £13bn in spending cuts, it needs to think again about how it treats the very public servants who are expected to deliver those services and those savings.”

in other sections of FDA. The changes mean that even if there is a change to FDA rules, it won’t create more problems for ARC members, as they are aligned, and you would be an associate of life member of both ARC and FDA. Jim Rogers was the first to move an amendment, but

This really was a straightforward “tidying up” of the rules, removing references to District Councils and replacing them with Centres.

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2015 Annual General Meeting

KEYNOTE ADDRESS

Tony Wallace ARC PRESIDENT

T

hank you and good afternoon colleagues. It gives me enormous pleasure to be here this afternoon to tell you about the work that your Union’s done over the past year and to set out our plans for the coming year. But just before I do that, I did think that I would maybe say a few words about the results of last week’s general election. I was, on Friday morning, rather surprised that the election result had turned out to be a majority government, and I think I wasn’t the only person in the room or across government who actually thought that.

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I think it’s fair to say, however, that although we anticipated being faced with a period of uncertainty, our expectation was that, irrespective of the shape or the colour of the new government, austerity would continue. And the result last week delivered on those expectations, albeit in a different form from what we expected. In terms of tax policy, the new government has said that amongst other things it will raise at least £5 billion from continuing to tackle tax evasion and aggressive tax avoidance and tax planning, building on the £7 billion of annual savings that have already delivered. It will lead international efforts to ensure global

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“We ourselves have also paid some of the costs of cuts. More than half of civil servants work over six hours beyond their contracted hours every week. One in ten of us work more than fifteen.” companies pay their fair share of tax, and it will make a crime of companies failing to put in place measures to stop economic crime such as tax evasion. Colleagues, when a government says that it will, what it means is it will rely on civil servants to deliver and make real the policies that it has set out.

We as civil servants will create and administer those policies, with the same vim and vigour with which we’ve approached all government policy in the past. However, delivery is not without cost, and we are entitled to ask something of government in return. In its own manifesto, it’s also said it will push ahead with civil service reform, it will make a further £10 billion annual savings by 2017-18, and £15 to 20 billion savings by 201920. It will find £13 billion from departmental savings, the same rate of reduction as in the parliament that has just gone. And that’s on top of cuts that over the last five years have resulted in a civil service that’s now smaller than at any time since the end of the second world war. Against that background and over the life of the parliament just ended we’ve delivered, but we ourselves have also paid for some of the costs of that. More than half of civil servants work over six hours beyond their contracted hours every week. One in ten of us work more than fifteen. On top of a pay freeze, and a cap that’s led to a real, and tangible, drop in our living standards, those extra hours mean that we hand back thousands of pounds every year to our employer – an invisible additional contribution to government savings and ending austerity.

We’ve taken aon the additional work to cover all the gaps that’ve been left behind by the colleagues who have gone. Colleagues, that approach to delivery, an approach that relies on an everincreasing expectation that civil servants will carry on, regardless of the personal cost to them – in terms of stress, time, money and pressure – has to be challenged, and that’s the theme to which I will return.

But what has the last year looked like for ARC

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Careers & Professionalism Julie continues with 10-14, and sees history being made.

As you would expect, the motions on careers and professionalism once again involved some great debate and much enthusiasm, but no-one foresaw history being made.

John Uriel of Liverpool Centre,

and first time AGM attendee, moved MOTION 10. Concerned about the downgrading of G6 roles, and other complications arising from peer management, it asked Committee to research the existence of peer management at grade 7 and to take active steps to eliminate it. John’s research showed there wasn’t much in the way of independent data on the subject, unless you include management of seaside piers.

Helen Andress of Bristol Centre moved an amendment which

noted that the motion began ‘This Centre’ and should read ‘This AGM’, but asked everyone to support the motion. The motion passed as amended.

Bob Young from Glasgow Cen-

tre moved MOTION 11, calling on Committee to engage with HMRC on the use of regional reserve lists for single or small scale vacancies. There was concern that the use of these reserve lists could be perceived as allowing managers unintended flexibility to position people for roles, potentially damaging engagement.

The background to this motion was based on one specific incident but Bob suspected there were more across the country.

A vacancy at grade 6 was advertised on promotion in one location, the promotion system was then used to create a reserve list which was used to fill a vacancy in a separate location fifty miles away. Clearly some of the grade 7s in the second location weren’t happy at being denied the opportunity. So the motion was asking for reserve lists to be location specific and be restricted to six months. With no speakers, and no amendments, the motion passed.

Next up was Andy Nixon of Glasgow Centre. MOTION 12

MOTIONS 10-14: CAREERS & PROFESSIONALISM

MOTIONS 10-14

noted the withdrawal of funding for tax professionals who wish to study for external professional qualifications, asking Committee to press for reinstatement.

Andy talked about the Department seeing a lot more people entering from the private sector‘s tax professions and many of those new colleagues (who we welcome to the department), come laden with external qualifications. That didn’t reduce the concern that these external qualifications are going to be regarded as of higher value than internal ones when it comes to future promotions and future job opportunities within the department. “It certainly seems such qualifications are a factor in that we’ve had a recent recruitment where people have come in at the top of a pay scale which our existing members are stuck on the bottom of for years.”

So what the motion was saying,

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TONY WALLACE (CONT)

2015 Annual General Meeting

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in terms of our union? Well, it’s been a good year.

When, twelve months ago, I became President, we were in the middle of an industrial dispute over PMR which we as a union ultimately came to recognise was not delivering for our members.

Civil servants were subject to an economic policy driven by austerity, and a 1% pay cap imposed by the Cabinet Office. And facilities for the activists in our membership were falling. You might not unreasonably be asking yourself well, what exactly has changed? My short answer to that is much, but there‘s still an awful lot to do. We’re back in a position of influence with our employer, and are re-engaged across the piece, and whilst our density still hovers around 48% – around the 48% mark, apologies – our focus in organisational recruitment is reinvigorating our members and their Centres.

On terms and conditions it’s easy to forget that whilst our campaign of industrial action was not ultimately a success, there were a great many other aspects of our terms and conditions that were under severe pressure during the life of the previous Committee of which I was a part. ARC successfully held back much of what was originally proposed, and it’s worth noting that those areas were not revisited in the lead up to the general election, in the way that we thought they might have been. On the contrary, the approach to reviewing what the employment offer for the senior member of HMRC might look like now is founded on an entirely different proposition.

Discussions are now about mutual benefit, and what can accrue to both the employer and the employee by positioning ourselves and HMRC, within the framework of a modern employment offering, and that’s not the same modern offering you heard about before.

Over the last year, we’ve also had to develop our approach to Building Our Future as a communications mechanism. Now, ARC’s position on this is fairly simple, although I do accept that it could have been articulated a lot more clearly than perhaps we have done in the past, and I will try to do that now. We invited Nita Clarke, the director of the Involvement Participation Association to look at HMRC’s organisation some time ago, to address the issue of engagement on the back of the rather unfortunate comments from Steve Lamie. Before Nita began her work, you told us that you wanted your employer to talk to its people, to have adult-to-adult conversations in an open, honest and engaging manner. ARC remains of the opinion that that is the right way to engage with people at work and whilst HMRC does that we will support those efforts. But, in encouraging those open, honest conversations

there must also be the time to challenge, with the expectation that such challenge will be respected and considered. Planning must include the space to allow ARC to influence outcomes, and we will hold our employer to those principles. Underlying all of that is the fundamental premise upon which this union is based, which is to protect the jobs and careers of our members. We shouldn’t lose sight of that fact, and we shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that against a difficult economic background of austerity and public sector shrinkage, the jobs of ARC members have remained not just protected but, in terms of the public profile, positively enhanced.

We spoke about pay a few moments ago. It continues to be a major disappointment. Civil service pay guidance for 2015-16 reaffirms the 1% pay cap, and once again makes it clear that pay progression is no longer a part of the public sector pay landscape. The gap between the pay of ARC grades compared to the tax professionals in the private sector who we face, has become a yawning gulf. Particularly for specialists – those in areas like international tax. The skills of our members are in high and growing demand as the economy begins to turn. That puts the delivery of HMRC’s business under severe pressure, as we see those with the key skills that the government needs

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transfer those skills from out of the organisation to the private sector. Now, the employer recognises those growing tensions, but frankly the funds available from HM Treasury to address recruitment and retension issues are still extremely limited. ARC has consistently made the case that our pay system needs proper resourcing, and radical reform. However so far the response is: people do not leave and the business is being delivered so there’s nothing to be fixed. Now I believe in progressive trade unionism. I believe in working with our employers, not against them. But an attitude that says: ‘as long as you stay, and suck it up, we will do nothing. As long as you will work longer and longer hours to pick up the strain, we will do nothing. As long as the money flows in, we will do nothing. In fact, until the business falls over, we will do nothing’ is not progressive. It’s the very antithesis of progressive employee relations, and it’s not what I expect of our employer. I’m urging them to talk, and work with us to persuade the Treasury of the business case and the threat to the delivery that that pay gap creates, and it’s why ARC will continue to press our simple message: cut the pay gap to cut the tax gap. Against that background of equal pay cases, press on.

Thanks in large part go to Helen, who spoke a wee while ago, for the tireless work that she’s

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they couldn’t have predicted just how split AGM would be on this matter. Recognising that this motion might be “a wee bit more controversial” Neil described the motion as a plea for Committee to press HMRC to reintroduce, in some form or another, the old ‘suitable for promotion’ box marking. The argument was that the current system favours “competence collectors and those good at selling themselves” and it gives no scope to managers to comment on applicant’s suitability for the post. At a time of endless pay freezes promotion is the only way anyone can actually secure a pay rise and while no one can blame anyone for trying this, there was concern it was leading to lots of inappropriate applications for posts.

Neil was clear that the motion did not want to go back to the days when the manager held all the cards but neither did Glasgow centre want the current free-for-all where the manager has no say whatsoever.

First up to speak to the motion was Steve Dodd from Leeds

Centre. Trying to avoid being controversial, there was a succinct plea that this motion possibly wasn’t the complete solution to the problem. The current job vacancy filling system isn’t working, and there are many aspects to this. Steve wasn’t against the motion, just highlighting the other work out there on this point, indeed he foresaw this as “something that’s an important piece of work for Committee for next year”.

Next up was Sarah Guerra from London Centre who wasn’t

MOTIONS 11-17: PMR

is that to ensure a level playing field of promotion opportunities and maintain professional standards there should be access to prestigious external qualifications for HMRC senior tax professionals. Andy also kindly asked Committee not to take it personally that the motion demanded, rather than instructed, them to work on this. AGM voted in favour and the motion passed.

Neil McFarlane represented Glasgow Centre, proposing MOTION 13. I’m willing to bet that

sure she was going to speak in opposition to this motion, but wanted to raise some concerns about it because there’s quite a lot of research within HMRC and generally, demonstrating that one of the barriers to promotion for those from under-represented groups are managers recommendations. This has been borne out in the positive action pathway where a whole variety of people from AA through to grades 7 and 6 have now been selected for talent programmes and are getting promoted, who would not have been able to get onto that pathway if they’d needed their manager’s approval. Sarah concluded that whilst she understood the sentiment of the motion and that managers’ views are an important part of the “suite of information”, we need to understand they can also present a barrier.

As there were no speakers expressly opposing the motion, there was no right of reply for Neil. After a fairly tight vote, Tony Wallace called in the scrutineers. This showed the vote was a dead heat, giving way to lots of slightly confused chuckles. Noone present could remember a dead heat in the history of ARC AGMs. Tony asked that at 42 for and 42 against, didn’t he get a casting vote? Graham Flew of Committee suggested remission of the motion. “This means that we take the spirit of it back, we

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2015

know what it wants to say, we like it, but we can’t quite decide that we want to vote in favour of it.”

However, Will Richardson of Committee spoke on a point

Annual General Meeting

of order. Will understood that Graham had moved the suspension of standing orders in order to suggest this but the reason he needed to move the suspension of standing orders in order to do it is because it is an “outrageous procedure and that’s why the standing orders forbid it. No one moved remission during the debate on this, no one moved remission before the vote was taken and remitting a motion, which means that you are broadly in favour of it, and the committee is instructed to take it forward as if it had passed but with some reservations, is not quite the same as accepting there’s a dead heat.” Will then highlighted that The President has a casting vote as well as a deliberative vote, asking Mr Wallace to follow convention in most organisations of exercising a casting vote in favour of the status quo. Which means that the motion would be defeated.

Tony took Will’s advice to stand with the status quo, voting against so the motion fell.

This is the kind of situation that makes you realise why rules motions are important!

Amy Carr represented Liverpool Centre in moving MOTION 14. The motion (which Liverpool centre was happy to accept as amended) reflected on the challenges

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of doing more with less, and concerns that Grade 6 and 7 skilled resource was being wasted on clerical work.

With a raft of retirements coming up, the impacts of this increasing admin burden would likely increase.

As a BLM for an increasingly large team of TPDP trainees, this was issue personally affected the speaker, whilst recognising that most of us feel like we now do two jobs.

“Where I feel I should be focussing my time is on mentoring and coaching my trainees. Instead I spend a lot of my time doing things that could probably be done by an AO or an O, like keeping spreadsheets of people’s mandatory learning records, photocopying people’s driving licences, analysing the post stats, co-ordinating who shares which cupboard, trying to do things like coach people how to use Caseflow and SA.” Quick to point out that she didn’t have any delusions of grandeur, Amy said some of these tasks she quite liked doing, because “it breaks up the PMR stuff”. The warm laughter from around the room was one of recognition.

Continuing her passionate plea, Amy was clear that what does bother her is not having the time to do the actual job and the possible detrimental knock on effects for trainees.

Speaking about numerous business cases that had been submitted, begging for some clerical support, but being told ‘HMRC don’t have enough people and we need to cut down the staff in those posts’.

Finishing by asking people to support the motion, Amy asked us to recognise the false economy of cutting clerical support, asking HMRC to “work a bit smarter”.

Alan Bamford from Leicester Centre formally moved the

TONY WALLACE (CONT)

done, and also for the work of Terry Cook, who, despite his retirement, still puts tremendous effort into this and whose knowledge of the historic pay picture in HMRC is comprehensive and without compare. And I just want to say a quick word about Terry, because I don’t know if you all know this; Terry was pretty ill recently. He’s had a serious operation for prostate cancer. He is recovering, we had a message from him earlier to say that he gets a bit better every day, and I hope you’ll all join me in wishing Terry all the very best from ARC here today.

Now on top of that we also have to remember those courageous members of our union, both claimants and comparators, who have been brave enough to take their cases before the employment tribunal for the benefit of you and the wider membership. Our evidence is being brigaded, our witness statements have been lodged, and our counsel is confident – we are absolutely ready to go on this.

Legal action is costly, and it is slow, but in the absence of an alternative path – and we asked for an alternative path at every opportunity – to resolve these issues, we will carry on. We are determined to improve the pay position for all of our members.

I’ll just touch on casework and PMR. Casework’s a fundamental part of what we do, it’s much valued by our members, and the numbers of you needing our help keeps growing. It keeps going up. With the limited resources and facility time that we have available, we’ve had to reorganise how we deliver on these expectations, and for that I need to thank Mark George and Graham Flew. Graham and Mark have been building our capacity to deliver that which our members need. PMR continues to be a cause for concern, a wide gulf remains between members’ perception of PMR as a quota-based ranking system, and the employer’s description of a simple system based on guided distribution.

However, ARC and the employer have been working together to develop progress on these areas. There’s been a degree of amelioration around some of the harder edges in the system, but our members continue to bring cases and appeals to us on a regular basis. The consultation and

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up to speak to the motion as amended, pointing out that this motion is in line with MOTION 48 from her centre – South and West Wales. It asks Committee to press the department to get evidence of grade 7 and 6’s doing unnecessary or inappropriate jobs for themselves, such as several G7s in Cardiff who are rung up on a daily basis to go and collect their post. They then go and stand in the queue to wait to be given their post, which isn’t necessarily even theirs. More of that later, but a hearty recommendation for the motion.

Inviting Mick Lett up to speak,

trainee, and while waiting for a course to start he was given his first job on the switchboard and doing the post. Thirty years on he’s a grade 6 on the max, who the week before AGM was putting letters in envelopes. More laughter followed when Mick commented on our collective talents “Amy mentioned we have two jobs, you have three actually because you’re all crap typists as well”.

Helen Baird Parker of Legal & Governance Centre, was the last

MOTIONS 11-17: PMR

the work with our employer will continue on that over the course of the next year, and we’re firmly committed to delivering further improvements in 2015-16.

Since long before the general election, which once again brought tax to the front of people’s minds, ARC’s been making sure that the work of our members does not slip from the public consciousness. We hosted the parliamentary event chaired by Margaret Hodge, with a panel made up of representatives from the main political parties, the accountancy profession and business, including both Grace Stevens who was here earlier, and myself on that panel as ARC President. The debate itself on tax standards and transparency was attended by over a hundred influential thinkers from across the business, the accountancy and the political world. We have regular meetings with politicians from across the full political spectrum, and we’ve got a wide range of contacts through Iain Campbell, who continues our work in public tax understanding in order to bring about a sea change in the public discussion of tax, and HMRC’s place in that work. We ensure that the public discussions include the need to properly resource HMRC, and to address the pay gap at ARC grades. Both featured in our autumn statement case for further investment last autumn. We will carry on with that work, and continue to make the case for ARC members, and more investment into HMRC. Recruitment in the organisation continues to be a key theme for ARC, and indeed for my presidency. Over the past year, Committee’s refocused its approach, with encouraging Centres to become more active and involved with Committee through our network of CLO’s, but we can’t be complacent. Our density remains below 50%, and we’re running flat out simply to stand still. Paula Houghton who continues her great work for ARC in the area, organised events in London and Birmingham, bringing together Centre officials from all around the country. We have action plans in place from Committee and in those Centres but the task for the next 12 months is to make those plans a reality – a plan’s a waste of time if you don’t do anything about it, frankly. But recruitment and organisation is a key responsibility for everybody in the union, and that includes

amendment. Alan was clear that Leicester agreed with the sense and the thrust of the motion.

The amendment was a minor tweak of words, suggested as “we thought the original motion could perhaps be read as being slightly elitist”. Speaking of the support staff in his office, Alan was clear that they are really appreciated, and how he feels ever so sorry for the people that don’t have that valuable resource.

Tamsin Wallbank was first

speaker in support of this motion. Helen spoke of the recruitment and retention problems in Sols, which “are so bad now, we’ve got so few lawyers, that we’re actually thinking about really doing this, about having better clerical support which is not something we’ve ever done before, so we’ve got a project ongoing to look at putting work at the right level”. Helen was clear that it’s not all about elitism, it’s about actually offering really good careers for clerical staff as well. Sols were looking at having professional careers as paralegals available which is something that everyone does in the outside world but for some reason HMRC has never done.

Asking us to support the motion, Helen made a plea for “professional people that are doing this clerical work for us and not just us trying to spread ourselves so thinly”. The motion was passed as amended.

Tony Wallace wondered if this would be the trademarked Mick Lett Death reference? It wasn’t yet time, but a promise that “He might [make an appearance] later in the day” brought a burst of laughter through the room. Mick spoke of joining the department in 1985 as a young

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MOTIONS 15-20

2015 Annual General Meeting

Trainee Matters With record numbers in Band T pursuing training courses that lead to Grade 7 it was hardly surprising that trainee issues would excite the AGM. Will Richardson reports.

MOTIONS 15 TO 20 inclusive concerned trainee issues. The first four, in common debate, concentrated on different aspects (and perceived disadvantages) of the new proposed streaming process for trainees. The debate kicked off with MOTION 15 from Liverpool Centre, expressing concern that trainees streamed onto regime-specific work would not be considered ‘fully-trained’ for other regimes and might face limited career prospects as a result. Liverpool’s suggested solution was to seek assurances that future job advertisements would only specify TSP and not any particular regime streaming within it. Eleanor Wood began by announcing that she was

one of Amy Carr’s trainees (Amy, from Committee, had spoken earlier in the AGM about her job as a BLM). As is now becoming traditional, Eleanor also announced that this was her first time at AGM. She explained that, unlike previous versions of streaming (involving working in a particular part of the department) the new proposal would involve trainees doing their last two years studying only one head of tax – CT, IT, VAT or EC. She went on “currently many jobs at grade 7 specify that a candidate must be fully technically trained and then

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you get a list of the courses that are expected to meet that requirement”. Trainees in Liverpool were concerned that in future “ a job advert might specify a particular stream of TSP rather than just being fully trained and we feel that this could really limit job opportunities available to us later on in our careers particularly for people who get assigned to streams that might not be quite in line with where they were hoping their career might go or in the area they were interested in, which could well happen given that you have very little input into where you’re sent to”.

The President then called MOTION 16, also from Liverpool, calling attention to the contradiction between early streaming and the flexible workforce so much talked of during Building our Future.

Stewart McKie, mentioning that he had only been in the department for three years spoke about his father’s career rather than his own. His Dad had been fully-trained and had pursued a varied career working in different directorates and with different heads of tax. “Building our Future envisages regions that will centralise HMRC’s work into strategic locations and within these regions people will have the ability to have a varied career. And a flexible workforce has to be underpinned, for me, within that framework. And the way that I see it is [ExCom] are pursuing streaming to build capability and flexibility. I would urge that we need clarification on how the Building Our Future flexible workforce fits in with the new streaming.” Stewart also accepted an amendment from Bristol Centre which was moved formally.

TONY WALLACE (CONT)

everybody in this room. I believe that ARC delivers an excellent professional service on behalf of its members, and that for people in the grades that we represent, our offering stands up to any scrutiny you want to give it. There’s never been a better time to go out there, and tell people about what we offer, to widen our membership base, and to take our density back to a level where any employer would ignore us at their peril.

There’s much that you can do for the benefit and the preservation of ARC. I’m urging you to do it. If you need help to recruit, then contact Paula, or contact me. We have resources available, and we will help you with whatever you need in that.

On the communications front I stood here last year a bit, um, grumpy, about Manchester’s motion, but we took it to heart. In January we introduced a new online monthly update, the Information ARC, and that’s designed to fill the place between arcnews and with regular messages and member’s updates. We’ve recently completed an exercise to retender for arcnews, and to develop a better website offering, and there’ll be more on that pretty soon. We will consult on how we use this to report back to you, and what happens here today, and what our officers, and what our Committee are doing to take forward the business that you have told us to take. We will do that.

Colleagues, in what’s becoming an increasing trend in recent years, there’s once again been a big turn over on ARC Committee. The pressure of people’s day jobs becomes ever greater, and the room to find the time to work on behalf of members shrinks. So far I’ve said goodbye to a number of friends and colleagues, Colin McHardy, Jim Mullen, Karen Austwick, and Gareth Hills, my predecessor. All of them have moved on to greater and better things, and it’s been a good move for them. The good news is that whilst we’ve lost some of the old talent, we’ve also been joined by some exceptional people. Vicky Johnson and Fran Hunter, who many of you have known for many years, and Blair Gardner, who comes all the way down from my stamping ground in Inverness. Finally a special mention to two other much respected past Presidents of ARC, Jeff Bryce and

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Jim Ferguson, both of whom retired very recently, and I’m sure again that AGM with join me in wishing both Jeff and Jim a long and happy and well deserved retirement.

We’re getting near to the end now, you’ll be pleased. Dave Penman in his speech this morning touched on the new deal for the civil service, and you’ll hear a lot more about that tomorrow. It means matching commitments to resource, it means tackling pay, it means valuing civil servants, it means enhancing your skills, and it means proper engagement across the whole of the civil service. Every one of those issues has featured during the course of my report to you today. I’m not going to pretend that we’re going to face an easy task over the next few years, you’re all intelligent people, that clearly is not going to be the case against the backdrop of continuing austerity. But I can promise you that our union will not shrink from making the case that the nation must deliver for you. I’ve reached the midpoint in my term as President, and there’s still a huge amount to be done.

But I have a great team of officers, and a dedicated Committee who will work tirelessly on your behalf. We will continue to make our case that to deliver for the government, the employer has to deliver for us. We will continue to make sure that HMRC consults, and builds in the time to make sure that your views are heard and considered. We will continue to build an organisation with which our members will be fully involved, with a clear sign of line of sight, all the way through to me as President, supported by active Centres, and an informed and engaged Committee.

But overall, we will continue to deliver for you, those who deliver for the nation.

Thank you for your continuing support and all that you’ve done for ARC

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explained the problem succinctly. “With the streaming process that’s currently ongoing, the lines of business are being asked to bid for potential future vacancies that they see within their areas. So those trainees [from the 2013 and 2014 cohorts] will be moved into streaming opportunities where it seems likely that they will eventually find promotion. Those of us in the 2012 cohort will be looking for promotion in a year’s time after the 2013s have been streamed into these potential positions and the 2014s are looking to be streamed into these potential positions., It appears that, by being in the cohort that we are, we have been seriously disadvantaged for the possibility of future promotional positions.

The current policy also is recruiting only into urban centres and I can only speak for our own experiences in Preston, but I’m sure there are an awful lot smaller offices around the kingdom are having the same problems, that when this streaming takes place our team will be reduced from 9 members to only 4, and all at the same point on the course, so the capability of our team is seriously compromised by the streaming process.”

MOTION 18 came from Glasgow Centre and criticised the management and communications around the imminent

streaming of the 2013 cohort, resulting in uncertainty for trainees. It asked Committee to seek a firm timetable and more transparent communications from the Tax Academy. Bob Young called for support from the previous three motions be-

MOTIONS 15-20: TRAINEE MATTERS

“I can promise you that our union will not shrink from making the case that the nation must deliver for you.”

MOTION 17 from Preston Centre concentrated on the situation in Preston, where current trainees (who are not streamed) will not be augmented by future trainees because they will go only to urban centres. Preston feared that their trainees, and others in similar non-urban centre locations, would lose out on career opportunities because business streams would effectively be filling many Grade 7 vacancies with trainees streamed into their business in the two years before promotion. Adi Bland, another AGM first-timer,

fore explaining “Our motion is slightly different in that you may be concerned that it tacitly accepts streaming, but what we’re actually asking for is that, where it takes place, it is done properly and we be kept informed and it be done timeously” The period of common debate then began, with Andy Nixon from Glasgow Centre urging support for the first three motions before hastily adding, to laughter from the AGM, that he wasn’t

actually opposing his own Centre’s motion. “I’m at the end of my career; I’m in a very specialist post, so this has no sort of direct impact on me. But…Building our Future is all about us trying to produce a flexible workforce and to achieve that we are removing flexibility from the people coming in. How can that make sense?

From the department’s point of view, apart from the careers of the individuals involved, it doesn’t make sense – from anybody’s point of view – to do this. I just am baffled.”

Kathleen Fowler from London BCD Centre began by announc-

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ing that she was a BLM and a regional BLM lead “so I’m that shadowy person who’s trying to sort a lot of this out for you”. She went on “There are a few things I want to say about this. I’m not speaking against any of these motions at all, but. There is a little ‘but’ here. There are so many vacancies at grade 7 that your location might be a problem in Preston, don’t know the answer to that. I don’t think, to be honest, that there will be that many problems in getting you good jobs. On the streaming front we have always had our trainees go all over the country into all different jobs on the back of a CT course that has qualified them to do personal tax and employment taxes as well. I’ve personally done all of those taxes in my career. The one I haven’t done is VAT. We’ve got very, very, good jobs in all of those regimes, don’t want to undervalue any of those regimes, as long as you are prepared to be flexible in your career you’ll probably get where you need to go. So that’s actually all I want to say. Talk to your regional leads about your problems though, because we’re trying to sort them out for you.”

Lucy Bradley, from Manchester Centre, made a con-

tribution from the point of view of the smaller businesses. “I work in quite a small niche area of the department and we’re actually struggling to get trainees to come to us because they’re saying ‘OK, well if I stream to indirect tax what does that then mean to me longer term?’ So support the motions, not just for the trainees, but also very small areas of the business who want some tax talent as well.”

All four motions were clearly carried on a show of hands, and the AGM moved

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on to motions 19 and 20, in common debate. MOTION 19 from North East Centre welcomed the significant increase in the number of trainees but expressed concern at the burden of coaching and support fro them falling on compliance staff. It called on Committee to work with the Tax Academy to ensure support for trainees.

Graham Turnbull, himself a

member of the 2014 cohort, expressed sympathy for the compliance staff in his office. “What I’m gonna do is strike straight to the heart of this. Across the business we’re losing exceptionally talented and skilled members of staff. This is to the private sector; this is to retirement and also reduced hours going part-time. The targets, however, are not reducing and so the burden on those remaining staff is increasing.

Then along comes myself, a 2014 trainee, and there are many more like me and there are many, many, more trainees to come. HMRC has expanded its recruitment and we’re taking in more and more people. I’m afraid that we have a thirst for the knowledge that those professionals that remain have, so we’re going to be drinking from an ever-dwindling pool.”

Acknowledging that there is already an awareness of the problem and that ARC has strong links with the Tax Academy, he went on to ask “that those links are used, that they are strengthened further, that ARC is proactive with early conversations, that it explores these issues and seeks solutions. And I’m talking about solutions that support not just the trainees in their learning, but that also supports the staff in their mentoring, to teach them how to do that, how to cope with the additional burden.”

Graham was followed to the rostrum by Rhys Hobbs

from London BCD Centre to propose Motion 20. London BCD also welcomed the increased number of trainees but expressed concern over the lack of clear direction and inconsistency in implementing the programme across regions and lines of business and sought Committee’s help in rectifying this.

Rhys began by announcing his own position as a 2013 trainee. “I’m one of the first years to have been placed directly into Large Business and what we’re calling on Committee to ask HMRC to do is to really consider, with the Tax Academy, what the purpose of placing us directly into Large Business is. There doesn’t appear to have been a clear plan or any kind of infrastructure put in place for us. To give an example: the first two years of our course are directed primarily at SME enquiries and Local Compliance casework, but there are no people in our office who do that kind of work who are able to support us in it, so it’s very unclear for us what it is we’re supposed to be doing, particularly when difficulties come up in our cases. We have difficulty getting cases in the first place. It took me six months to get my first case. They didn’t come with any SIPs, they didn’t come from RIS, they were what other offices didn’t really want to do.” He went on to ask that the Tax academy consider “what the purpose of placing us into Large Business is, if they then want us to do Local Compliance work for our first year or two years.

They don’t seem to have really given it any thought other than to say that it might be a good idea so let’s just do it.”

He called on Committee to work with the Tax Academy

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good work for the trainees in their early years, he said it was not just a question for the Tax Academy, mentioning SME and Mid-Sized Businesses as well “so don’t just limit it to Tax Academy and do recognise that as a Committee we’re aware of it and we’re doing things that we can as we take this forward.”

Mike Simmons of Leicester Centre was another BLM,

noting that there seemed to be lot of them present at the AGM. “As well as all the spreadsheets that Amy has to fill in I spend my days looking for cases because they don’t come from where they’re supposed to come from. I’m begging for mentoring support from SME or wherever I can find it, anybody to help me out with cases. There are two and a half CT grade 7s in my office and 8 trainees. The two and a half CT grade 7s haven’t done full enquiries for at least 8 years. Trainees are all doing full enquiries. It doesn’t work, we need to beg resources from everywhere else, it just needs to be thought about

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better. Please support the motions.”

Mark Bingham from Northern Ireland Centre wanted to make two points. “ Year

after hear we see a host of motions around trainee issues support, BLM support; and I know Committee is very active and has relationships with the Tax Academy, but I think we need to send a very clear message that consistently there are issues, and we’re always playing catch up, and we’re not thinking ahead enough. And the other thing I wanted to say was that it’s absolutely incredible and very encouraging to see so many trainees here today, speaking about this kind of issue and actually getting up and proposing motions as well, so I just wanted to celebrate that.

I think it’s a major success.”

Former President Gareth Hills from Bristol Centre found himself “dismayed

that I have to be supporting [the motions] because these were inevitable consequences of a series of governments that did nothing to recruit people into HMRC.” He and Graham Black had told the Treasury Select Committee some time ago that the pipeline was going to cause problems. But Gareth also wanted to celebrate the presence of so many trainees when other departments were cutting back, a success for HMRC in part due to the campaigning of ARC on the need for resources.

Tim Lintott from Brighton Centre also welcomed the number of trainees in recent years. He could remember the years when recruitment freezes meant that trainees were as rare as dodos. “Every year we’d say we’re getting older we need more people but now suddenly it’s raining trainees. I have to say it’s great to see many of you here; we really need the younger generation to slightly reduce the ever advancing average age of the people present here. But we need to look after this resource, it’s a valuable resource, it’s a crucial resource if we are actually going to deliver the very demanding targets the government have set us, particularly in terms of compliance and in countering evasion and avoidance.” He demanded a joined-up policy, including BLMs and Grade 6s and 7s in local offices, but especially from ExCom and the Tax Academy.

The parade of those involved in training continued with Tamsin Wallbank, a tutor on TSP 14 speaking for

South and West Wales Centre. “ I’m not speaking against I just want to point out the final paragraph of motion 19: This AGM instructs Committee to continue to build and strengthen links with the Tax Academy to ensure that there is an appropriate level of support for trainees in developing their skills and experience. At the Tax Acad-

emy we would love to do this but we’re not in the office with the trainees, we provide the academic side and I hear exactly what the BLMs are saying: they are saying they want to provide case support to their trainees, there are not enough G7s out there to do that.” She concluded that it would be a dark day if local compliance staff didn’t feel it was part of their job to help trainees, but recognised that the problem lay in lack of resources.

Mick Lett speaking for West

MOTIONS 15-20: TRAINEE MATTERS

to ensure the right infrastructure is in place, concluding “we want to do our jobs and we want to do them well and we’re left not sure whether we are actually doing the right thing.”

The first speaker in the common debate was Dave Cooper from Committee.

Explaining that his day job in SME involved trying to find

Midlands Centre, began by teasing the AGM by withholding, for the moment, his annual mention of Death (it always has a capital letter when Mick says it). Back in 1998 Mick had done some work on the retirement bulge which the department was now experiencing. “In 1998, to maintain the Grade 7 and grade 6 FTE Inspector portfolio, the department had to promote – not recruit, promote – 150 Grade 7s every year from 1998 to 2015, something it has spectacularly failed to do. It is now running round like a headless chicken panicking like mad and it’s gonna be shoving poor trainees into jobs that they won’t be fully equipped to do because basically they’re putting you in the gaps where colleagues have fallen away.”

No one having spoken against either motion, they were both passed easily on a show of hands. The debate had been remarkable for showing no opposition to any motion but nonetheless producing a variety of viewpoints from trainees and from other members involved in various aspects of training and in supporting trainees in the office.

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KEYNOTE ADDRESS

Grace Stevens DIRECTOR OF GROUP TAX, LEGAL AND GENERAL

2015 Annual General Meeting

Introduction by Iain Campbell Just a few quick words then about the thing we call External Focus. External Focus may seem nothing to do with trade union activity: it’s all externally focussed, it doesn’t talk about terms and conditions, it doesn’t talk about pay; but, on the other hand, I think the success of that work – Dave talked about it today in his speech, Tony mentioned it in his report – is that, from our perspective on Committee, what we see is that the External Focus recognises that we’ve got a twin role. We are a trade union and we like to think we’re an influential trade union, but we’re also a professional association and we’re interested in the legislation, the policies and all the underpinnings of how we go about doing our jobs. And I think, and Committee thinks, that the two things actually support each other and reinforce each other. We get external credibility because we’re a strong trade union and, because we’ve got that external credibility, we can then raise issues which do relate to terms and conditions, to investment in HMRC, to expanding the work we do, without people in the outside world accusing us of somehow, you know, seeking jobs for the department and pursuing our self -interest, and of not actually advocating policies that we genuinely believe will make a difference to the way that public finances operate.

So, on that basis, we’ve been having events and, as Tony said, we had an event in parliament last year when Grace spoke and you know what Grace said was very well received; it was the voice of business and she was saying in her speech that business is very silent in this public debate and it needs to be, you know, perhaps ventilated more. And so this year will be a contrast; last year we had a speaker from the understanding group called Chris Johns who was from Oxfam so this, in a sense, kind of provides a bit of a balance and a change of perspective.

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MOTIONS 21-24

Terms & Conditions and Health & Safety Will Richardson reports on a mixed bag of motions covering basic conditions.

MOTION 21 from Manchester Centre on Health & Safety criticised the lack of help from HMRC when members have an accident at work, and called for improvements to the guidance.

Jonathan Aldcroft explained the

T

hank you very much for the invitation to speak today and at the previous event. I felt slightly outnumbered at the previous event, it was all politicians, and me, and I was sat with Richard Murphy in the audience asking questions so it was easy to feel slightly outnumbered. So I thought I’d just talk for a little bit about some of the things that I’m thinking about at the moment, and my perspective on what’s going on in the tax world, the things that worry me, how we work, and like to work with HMRC, and then see if there’s anything else that people would like to ask questions on or hear more about. So, I do think there’s been so much public and media debate about this, and I think big business has been the least of the voices in all of that. It’s catching up, you’re seeing stuff come through, and the CBI’s doing quite a bit of work on this at the moment, so they’ve published their principles a few years ago, but there’s more coming out of the CBI on that.

They’ve got the great business debate website that they’re running some things on – you’re beginning to see some more stuff coming through. But I think it’s still been quite in the early days. The agenda is still very much set by the activists, by the political agenda, and by the NGOs, who have particular things that they are interested in. But that agenda I don’t think is going away – the public concern, the political concern. I look forward to the days when I don’t get a call about every six weeks from my father, because he’s read something terrible about tax planning in the newspapers, and wants to talk to me or shout at me about it down the phone.

That’s so. But I think that’s here to stay, I think that’s the environment we’re looking at, I think transparency will come, I think it’s all there. And I think that’s a good thing. We’ve seen in the

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origin of the motion in an accident suffered by two of the Centre’s members while travelling in a pool car. Because the fault lay with a third party there was no process for the member to get help with the financial costs incurred in obtaining treatment to facilitate a full return to work.

The guidance merely required them to submit a claim against the culpable third party, with no elucidation on how this might be done. “If it wasn’t for the advice that the members received from ARC themselves the next steps might have remained a complete mystery. When a member of staff is injured at work the employer’s duty of care should, as a minimum, involve guidance which explains step-by-step what they must do if they are to require treatment. The guidance is currently very far from this minimum standard and ARC must hold [HMRC] to account on its improvement.”

Andy Nixon, Glasgow Centre, urged support. He quoted the case of members involved in a road traffic accident while at work who were still trying to

find out whether the inevitable absence would count against their quota of sick leave in case of future illness.

Mick Lett from West Midlands Centre then finally gave AGM his annual mention of Death.

“The moment you’ve all been waiting for” he announced to laughter. “I should imagine that if the guidance is a bit short on what happens if you’re injured, it’ll need amending and revising when you’re dead, when you’re killed in an accident. On an even more serious issue there is compensation for injury at work as part of the pension schemes and it might be worthwhile those members looking at that because perhaps they can get some additional money coming in.”

No one having spoken in opposition, the motion was carried easily on a show of hands and the AGM moved on to Terms and Conditions.

First up were two motions, 22 and 23, dealing with flexible working. MOTION 22 from Norfolk and Suffolk Centre was concerned with the mixed messages being sent by HMRC on home working and flexible working, especially at Building our Future events, and sought clarification. Paula Houghton proposed.

MOTIONS 21-24: TERMS & CONDITIONS AND HEALTH & SAFETY

“I look forward to the days when I don’t get a call about every six weeks from my father, because he’s read something terrible about tax planning in the newspapers, and wants to talk to me or shout at me about it down the phone.”

With members in Norwich and Ipswich, both locations with outside the likely regional hubs discussed in BoF, the Centre was concerned. “Not everyone can up sticks and move house to follow the relocation of their HMRC job, nor do many of us want to. For a huge number of reasons many of their jobs are not location specific so why would it even be desirable to make a move? At the moment the department is giving out mixed messages. Some areas are being told that distance working is available and desirable and that some roles may be retained in that way, and some are being

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GRACE STEVENS (CONT)

“We’ve been on a journey, we’ve increased our tax disclosures, we’ve spoken at events, we’ve engaged with NGOs, so we’ve spoken to Oxfam, Action Aid, Christian Aid, we’ve had some of those conversations.”

2015 Annual General Meeting

financial crisis, with governments wanting to bring us austerity measures, cuts in public spending, and reducing the budget deficit while trying to revive the economy. And a lot of that has come down to raising more taxes without actually raising more taxes. So, the agenda point has been about tax avoidance, most of the debate has been on that. Introducing measures to address the tax gap, which everyone accepts exists, although no one can agree how it is calculated or what the number is. But how you deal with that, what makes up that tax gap, and how you collect it. So tax avoidance has been a massive plank in this, and we’ve seen it in the election, with the scale of the money expected to be raised by additional measures and resources to address tax avoidance, with numbers with fairly limited science behind them. But I think [it’s] really clear, it was a message across the board, that this is something that’s here to stay for this parliament, and we’re going to have to find a way to deal with it, both as business and as HMRC, and I’m sure that’s going to be a challenge across the board.

We’re seeing more and more pressure every time there is an article about another company who is being investigated, whether that’s EU State Aid, we saw in the Australian budget just this week where they’ve announced that there are 30

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companies that they are planning to investigate around diversion of profits. They’ve come out and said they’re not planning to mimic the UK DPT, but they’ve got the same shortlist, basically, of companies they want to attack. So it’s here, it’s here and it’s across the board.

And we’ve done quite a lot on this, you know, we’ve published, we’ve done quite a lot on tax transparency and we’ve done quite a lot on our own wider CSR agenda, you know, our role in society is important to us as an organisation. For those of you that don’t know, Legal and General is one of the UK’s biggest financial services institutions, we cover asset management, life insurance, pensions, all kinds of things like that. And we’re predominantly a UK-based group. And while it’s easy to say that big business is quite silent, our CEO is one that isn’t. He blogs on our website all the time, he writes for some of the newspapers, he had an article on 9 May in The Telegraph talking about the political landscape and the tax landscape post-election. So not only does he talk about some of the wider things that he’s thinking about, he also actually blogs and talks about tax in his stuff. We have a CEO that’s genuinely engaged in tax. I think it’s sometimes not apparent to everyone that that’s part and parcel of the debate internally. And we do think that paying tax is part of how our business contributes. We do understand the changing landscape and the pressures. But that’s the environment we’ve operated in. So we’ve been on a journey, we’ve increased our tax disclosures, we’ve spoken at events, we’ve engaged with NGOs, so we’ve spoken to Oxfam, Action Aid, Christian Aid, we’ve had some of those conversations, and we’ve got more stuff available for people to look at about our approach to tax than ever before this year. So there’s a page in our annual report and accounts going live over the next couple of weeks, there’s some further information in our CSR report that goes online,

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mittee. It too called on ARC to negotiate on flexible working, noting that UK government policy favoured it as a social good and for its economic benefits, but that HMRC too often failed to follow through in its attitude toward its own staff. The motion also drew attention to the diversity benefits of flexible working, especially for parents and carers, and the business benefits for HMRC. Helen explained that she was currently working on a project on flexible working with the department, sponsored by the diversity and inclusion team. The centre of HMRC was quite keen, but the department is “in the dark ages” on flexible working, far behind other government departments and the private sector. Noting that the change of law allowing people to request flexible working has not yet been reflected in HMRC guid-

ance, she added “It is, of course, something that’s really positive for the business; it’s something that they’re going to have to look at with our changing business and with us radically downsizing. It makes sense for the business and I think we’ve got quite a long way to go to persuade HMRC this isn’t just something fluffy that you give to people with caring responsibilities; it actually makes sense for their business.”

Bristol Centre had proposed an amendment to MOTION 23, making reference to a Cabinet Office report on flexible working and Gareth Hills proposed the amendment which Helen had indicated Committee fully accepted. Gareth explained that the purpose of the amendment was to strengthen Committee’s hand in its discussions with HMRC. He quoted from the Cabinet Office report Transforming the Way We Work “work in the 21st century is about what you do not where you do it. Strategic use of new technologies enables much of the work we do to be carried out from many other locations as well as offices.”

Gareth went on to contrast this forward-looking approach with the briefing given to members presenting BoF3, discouraging any idea that home working and flexible working might be viable options for HMRC, concluding “so it seems to me that there are mixed messages coming from HMRC and this report and this amendment will strengthen the motion and give Committee added leverage to use with the employer.”

There was clearly no opposition to the amendment and Committee had indicated acceptance, so AGM quickly voted it through, whereupon Tony Wallace invited speakers on MOTION 22 and on MOTION 23 as amended.

Steve Dodd, Leeds Centre,

MOTIONS 21-24: TERMS & CONDITIONS AND HEALTH & SAFETY

and we’re actually launching for the first time a tax page as part of our investor website, that includes access to our tax policy, how we manage our tax risk, and all those kind of things. So a distinct move towards transparency in what we’re doing.

And that’s it! It’s become kind of the changing role of the tax director, I think, and just in my time, the approach to taxes [has] changed. Tax started off as being a pure compliance function, back office, nobody ever went to talk to tax people, because they weren’t that exciting, and they sat in a corner, and got on with things. They didn’t really engage.

That moved, there was a period of time where tax functions – I have to say, not at L&G, but more generally – were seen as the potential for being a profit centre, they were the sort of, the hay day, if you would like to call it that, of the planning scheme, and I think a lot of people did a lot of things. I think that day’s gone as well. Certainly, the organisations I’ve worked for in my career, they’ve never been at the aggressive end of any of that. And I think that that time has gone for most people these days, it’s about tax risk management, it’s about publicly stating what you will and won’t do, what your appetite to do these things is. And I think, not only now are tax directors expected to be technicians, and to be all over the legislation, it’s not just corporate tax, it’s your indirect taxes, it’s your operational taxes, your product taxes. You know, if a policy holder calls and says they think they’ve had the wrong tax deducted from their pension scheme, there’s reasonably good odds that at some point that call will come through to me and we’ll be trying to work that out, and how we deal with that.

It’s across the whole piece, so my job now is about embedding our approach to tax throughout the entire business – so does everybody understand what our tax strategy is? Does everyone understand what appropriate behaviours are? Do we have a consistent message in all of our interactions on

told that it’s not an option at all.” Noting that talk of HMRC being a modern employer had tailed off recently, she went on “many private sector employers will bend over backwards to retain their talent, providing people with the technology required and the flexibility to work from wherever is feasible. We need clarity on the options and we need to respond to any argument against flexible solutions by demonstrating exactly how much experience at our grades will be lost across the UK if the withdrawal from outlying offices means redundancy for all those working in those locations. Flexible working makes sense for our members and research shows that it has no adverse impact on productivity or engagement with the employer. In fact it can increase both by giving people the freedom to work in a way that fits in with their own lives and commitments.”

Helen Baird-Parker then proposed MOTION 23 from Com-

spoke in support of both motions. Referring the inconsistency in HMRC’s approach which Paula had brought out, Steve

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GRACE STEVENS (CONT)

2015 Annual General Meeting

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said “And I think that’s likely to get worse unless the union intervenes. I think that’s an opportunity.” He also said that this wasn’t a problem confined to towns outside the regional centres; there were areas on the fringes of regional centres with similar problems. He asked that Helen Baird-Parker comment on the safeguards around flexible working. He was followed

by Graham Flew speaking as a Cambridge Centre representative expressing support for their nearest neighbours in East Anglia. AGM then heard from two speakers disclosing that their Centre was part of a flexible working pilot, Vicky Johnson from the West Midlands Centre and Peter Horne from London BCD Centre.

Both asked that Helen keep in touch with them, Peter adding that as the father of a child with special needs, flexible working had been important to him throughout his career.

Responding to requests from earlier speakers Helen Baird-Parker said that safeguards had yet to be negotiated, but she was aware of local pilots and local policies.

Her aim in talking to the centre was to stop local managements developing their own ‘flexible working policies’ all too often aimed at preventing people from working flexibly.

“I’m very concerned about that; I will be looking into it and I’ll be investigating. If other people are experiencing similar things please do get in touch with me; I need to know the details so that I can take action about it.”

Bothe motions were passed easily on a show of hands.

MOTION 24 from London Euston Centre was about the increasing number of younger trainees with lower annual

leave entitlements and, in London, a longer working week, than older members. It instructed Committee to negotiate this with management and consider Employment Tribunal action if HMRC refused to move. I moved the motion as Centre Secretary, in the absence of the original mover.

I acknowledged that Committee would not regard this as an area on which we would have much leverage, but the motion only asked Committee to consider legal action.

“With a certain amount of pessimism” I commended the motion to AGM. Responding for Committee, Helen BairdParker began “I’m speaking on behalf of Committee, not against this but just to urge a note of caution as to what we can achieve here and to manage expectations. This is a really really important issue to me personally, not only because I just got promoted in April so I’ve just lost some leave, but it’s been a really important issue throughout and I just want to remind AGM that this was actually one of the points that we went to industrial action on.” Promising to continue the pressure, she expressed doubt whether it was an issue on which the Employment Tribunal could help. The President then put the motion to the vote and it was carried overwhelmingly.

that? The reputational risk and the press attention mean that tax is on the board agenda. Look at the sheer pace of legislative change right now: we’ve got BEPS, we’ve got financial transactions tax coming, we’ve had the DPT that came in and the last finance bill that had a whole single day of parliamentary debate, and then it’s live, and we’re dealing with it, and everyone knows that it’s perhaps not drafted in quite the right way in all the places; you know, we’ve got another finance bill coming, there’ll be another raft of changes there that we’ve got to deal with. An example for my industry was the 2012 budget with the pension changes, removing the need to buy an annuity. That fundamentally changes all of the things that we do as part of our business, that changes our business model, it means we’ve got to change our systems, and we need to be able to cope with all of that.

We’ve got to deal with questions from policy holders, that level of change and that pace of that pace of change and the presence constantly of tax debate in the media means we get a lot of questions.

You would be astonished, I think, how many emails and calls I got following the announcement of the so-called Google tax, the diverted profits tax from people who have been [asking], just ‘does this affect us, how does this affect us?’; and it’s like, “well the very second I can see some legislation we’ll have that conversation, that will be great”. Not particularly expecting tears, but managing those messages internally is quite hard. And we’re expected to be certain. I’ve had to forecast my cash tax payments across the board, my effective tax rate, my impact on all of our various financial reporting and solvency metrics, with the advent of solvency due, we’ve got a whole raft of work about how we deal with deferred tax and solvency too, which is part of the things that we do. But forecasting is key, and the level of change makes that quite a challenge. You know ‘no surprises’ is a bit of cliché now in the business world, but really that’s what my CFO is looking for from me.

And one of the things I think that helps with that, from my perspective, is the changing relationship with HMRC. The Tax on the Boardroom Agenda from

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a few years ago, has been very successful in getting tax on the agenda. The introduction of the CRM arrangements and having a single point of contact whom we can talk to, that means we can have discussions in real time. I appreciate that HMRC has as many resource pressures, as I do, around doing more with less, and expecting to achieve more and contribute more. But the advent of the CRM relationship is by no means the so-called cosy arrangement that Margaret Hodge likes to talk of, where there are disagreements. We do disagree about things, we will have different interpretations, we’ll want to do things on different timelines.

But being able to have those discussions in real time, sensibly and openly, about what the analysis is, what we’re looking at doing, what we’ve got coming through the pipeline, really helps because even if we don’t agree – and those are quite robust discussions – what it does give me is certainty, you know, that enables when I’m forecasting to model what our return on economic capital be. You know we know what my role in that is, I can help play that through, and that’s been really good.

And it does take time. It’s about building a relationship of trust, and that takes time to do, across the board. And it takes a bit of a leap of faith about providing quite a lot of information quite early, and we’ve certainly done that on a couple of things, you know, where we’ve had quite a strict deadline, so we’ve sent kind of technical analysis as a sort of draft in progress. This is the kind of work that we’re doing, this is the kind of approach we’re taking; are you comfortable with what we’re doing?

We’ve done things like that. We’ve done things like share a copy of our risk log, what are the current risks that we’re looking at periodically? Certainly when I said that to one of my peers elsewhere in the business community it was met with a fairly horrified reaction. But I think, you know, it does help, and you do have to take that leap of faith. I think the advent of automatic exchange of information makes some of that harder, because the way that the cooperative compliance approach is embedded within the UK isn’t embedded in many other countries; so that automatic exchange of information, I think there’s a risk there about the way that we work. That things that we’d

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PMR The debate on PMR was one of the shorter ones at AGM this year, but also one of the most entertaining.

Will Richardson reports.

The debate on PMR began quietly enough with MOTION 25 from North East Centre, moved forward from the afternoon session while AGM awaited the arrival of a guest speaker. The motion noted the concerns expressed in the People Survey and in ARC’s own survey and instructed Committee to liaise with other FDA sections to seek lessons from other departments from which ARC members could benefit.

Polly Washington moved the motion succinctly, starting with a round of applause for confessing that it was her first AGM. “I get the topic of PMR. So this isn’t about agreeing or disagreeing with PMR it’s just about whether there are any lessons that we can learn from elsewhere to make it a less painful process for all of us, less of a time burden for all of our ARC members. Other FDA branches and other unions don’t appear to be as impacted by PMR as us. Why is this? Is there anything we can learn from them?”

Paula Houghton followed Polly to the rostrum to respond for Committee. Mentioning that she also sat on the FDA EC, Paula said she was happy to take the motion forward. “We do have conversations about PMR with our colleagues on the FDA EC and I’m very aware that many of them do appear to be less concerned about it than we are. Whether they are content or whether they are just more accepting I’m not sure but I’m perfectly happy to go and ask them and find out.”

MOTION 26 from Hull Centre highlighted the ‘guided distribution’ in PMR, calling on Committee to draw ExCom’s attention to its detrimental effect and on Lin Homer to admit that validation groups are ranked league tables rather than applying standards which are then ‘revisited’.

Such honesty would, the motion said, be a breath of fresh air. Paul Fairbank proposed the motion in a variety of comedy voices and impersonations.

Referring to previous years when his speeches had adopted a theme, he warned the AGM that he was

going to push the boat out a bit this year. “Day three in the celebrity big brother household. Housemates have been set the task of applying HMRC’s PMR to their careers. To win a luxury hamper they have to deliver guided distribution. Chris Eubank, the Rolling Stones, David Bowie and Steven Gerrard have been arguing for over five hours now” followed by more laughter. Working his way through the characters Paul satirised the PMR system, ending with Sean Connery in the Big Brother diary room. “So HMRC set the standard. For 007 it would be things like smartness, sexiness, sophistication; anything else with an S that makes me sound remotely like Sean Connery. Then we revisit the standards if we don’t meet guided distribution. Surely they should just admit that it’s a ranking system and be honest with the staff.

In that case George Lazenby definitely must improve.” Ending with a declaration that he doesn’t pay UK tax anyway, Sean Connery (and Paul Fairbank) quit the rostrum to applause and laughter.

Loz Hutton was left with the unenviable task of not only following Paul but trying to amend his motion. Committee’s amendment sought to delete words that might imply acceptance of the guided distribution as part of PMR, and Hull Centre was content to accept this so the AGM passed it.

Tamsin Wallbank then spoke in favour of the motion, beginning with an announcement, to laughter from the AGM, that she had only got up because she wanted to speak more times than Mick Lett. Adding that she planned to speak to a motion at the FDA ADC the following day she quoted from that motion: “This ADC calls on Executive Committee to seek to remove – that’s the art in it – the guided distribution from performance management. I will be speaking to that tomorrow I thoroughly support this because guided distribution is utterly demoralising it’s horrible to be in competition with one’s colleagues.”

No one wanted to oppose the motion and on being put to the AGM by the President it was passed overwhelmingly.

MOTIONS 25-26: PMR

MOTIONS 25-26

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MOTIONS 27-35

Pay 2015 Annual General Meeting

Lot of passion, but almost no disagreement within ARC, characterised the pay debate in 2015. Will Richardson reports.

Predictably, the pay debate was one of the biggest at the AGM, attracting nine motions and a lot of anger directed at government and departmental policy on pay.

We kicked off with MOTION 27 from South and West Wales, short enough to reproduce in full: that this AGM instructs Committee to continue to seek the recommencement of pay progression, including progression to the maximum of that pay range in five years or less.

Tamsin Wallbank proposed

for her Centre in a speech which was also short and to the point. “It’s a pretty simple motion. We would like pay progression we would like pay progression in five years we recognise that it would be a miracle if we actually received it but hey we’re gonna ask for it. So please support the motion thank you very much.” Either the content or the brevity elicited a round of applause from the AGM. MOTION 28 from London BCD Centre was in common debate (as was 29) and concentrated on the shortening of scales at the expense of the maximum, noting that as more people retire, an increasing proportion of grades 7 and 6 are concentrated near the bottom of the ranges. It called on Committee to seek a pay settlement which restored progression and increased the maxima. Andy Mill began by saying “I suppose, you know, we could applaud our

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employer for actually narrowing the gap between the minima and the maxima for both the grade 7 and grade 6 pay scales.” It soon became clear, however, that Andy hadn’t come to the podium to deliver plaudits. Noting and welcoming the record number of trainees in the department, he pointed to the changing demographic pattern this produces, with increasing concentrations at the lower ends of pay scales. “But the cost of our grade 7s and grade 6s to the department, I would say, would appear to be on a downward trajectory because for all of those trainees, all of the people that we’re bringing into the department are going to be sitting there when they get to grade 7 on the minima.” Reminding the AGM that those on the maximum had seen no pay rise in recent years he ended “and let’s see some movement on pay maximas this year.”

MOTION 29 from Glasgow Centre was the last in this section of common debate. Draw-

ing attention to the inequity caused by years of pay freeze followed by pay capping, it noted that a CRM with five years experience at Grade 7 was paid the same as a newly promoted CRM, with a greater burden and expectation under PMR. It called on HMRC to redress the injustice.

Former President Graham Black proposed. He said

GRACE STEVENS (CONT)

be happy to talk to HMRC about, we might not be happy if that automatically got shipped to the IRS, or the Chinese tax authorities, or the Indian tax authorities, who are always so rational in their approach to life.

I think there’s some challenges there, around that automatic exchange of information, and around the important of governance on both sides, for business, for HMRC, but making sure that we’ve got the right governance arrangements in place, that we don’t throw out all the benefits that we’ve had from cooperative compliance, and for me that’s mostly about certainty, and not having masses of back years, and not working sort of 12, 18 months in arrears of the actual transaction. Because it means if I want somebody to come and explain what we’ve done and why, that person is still in the business in that area working in that business unit it’s got all the papers on that project – much easier that trying to find someone who’s, you know, three jobs on and 18 months down the line.

So I think there’s a lot for us still to do there. And I think the big thing for me is about looking forward. We’re postelection, we’ve got a five year term. It does feel like the debate around tax is going to continue. But I do also feel that what policy making hasn’t done, and this is something that our CEO was talking about in his recent article, has been fairly short-termist. It’s not about looking for the long term, what’s the right thing in the long term, how do we get to the right places, and I think there’s a role for that.

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The speech was followed by an extensive Question and Answer session which will be available in the full transcript of the AGM, to be posted on arc-forum in the autumn.

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AGM to bear with her “because I’m doing a double act. Vicky Johnson, West Midlands, moving motion 30 and then Vicky Johnson, Committee, proposing an amendment to motion 30 which Vicky Johnson, West Midlands, and West Midlands Centre accept.” AGM moved to an immediate vote on the amendment and it was carried. The motion attacked the continued pay cap and the growing gap between the pay of HMRC professionals and their private sector counterparts. It instructed Committee to take this forward with HMRC. Vicky spoke briefly. “We go into day-to-day dispute with very highly paid professionals some of whom are our ex-HMRC colleagues and we’re successful but year after year we’re rewarded with minimal increases in salary. ExCom say their hands are tired well they may well be, but

surely they could put a fight up for us even while their hands are tied and surely speaking up for their staff is the least they can do when they take our successes and trumpeted them through mediums such as Building our Future 2.”

The other motion in common debate came from Committee.

MOTION 31 also drew attention to the pay gap, as well as the need to ensure that ARC members have the skills to keep up with their comparators. It called on Committee to engage with the employer to seek a joint busi-

MOTIONS 27-35: PAY

We need to be looking long term, provide that certainty and stability. You know, how are we going to deal with BEPS when it comes in, do we know how it’s going to work? Actually being able to track forward when we do things and we can actually look forward and plan, and you get questioned you know, what’s it going to cost us to implement BEPS? Don’t know, haven’t got the final papers yet. Don’t know if it will change anything I don’t think it should change anything because I don’t think we’re doing anything that, politically, it [BEPS] should be catching, but we don’t know what the details are yet, I don’t know what resource I’m gonna need and I think that kind of quick ambiguous inconsistent legislative knee-jerk reaction, I think that’s the biggest challenge.

What kind of tax policy do we want going forward, what kind of a way of interacting between Treasury and HMRC, between HMRC and business, between Treasury and business, between business and the wider tax transparency debate? I think we need to move away from all the knee-jerk reactions across the board and think about what we want going forward in terms of tax policy and the country. And I think that’s the biggest challenge that I see; certainly how we plan all around this, and I think that’s probably how we develop the way that we work with HMRC and Treasury going forward

wouldn’t speak for long because he didn’t expect to be howled down by conference for calling for pay progression. Recalling the old days of progression, imperfect but at least there, he contrasted this with the years of pay freeze and pay cap. “The system we have is no longer fit for purpose. The whole system needs to be revamped, it’s been left to fester for too long. We have an argument now around the fact that we need to recruit and retain our best people in HMRC in order to deal with tax evasion and tax avoidance which is big on the political agenda Let’s shout that message, let’s have them actually address the issue once and for all.”

All three motions were passed easily on a show of hands and no further speakers.

AGM then moved on to two more motions in common debate, beginning with MOTION 30 from West Midlands Centre.

Vicky Johnson, proposing, asked

ness case to put to the Treasury.

John Parkhouse proposed for Committee. Acknowledging that this Committee pay motion read much as previous ones, John added that the times were different because of the results of which HMRC didn’t hesitate to boast. “But also results that our politicians trumpeted as being very good during the general election campaign just gone; one of the ministers for the Treasury announced the coalition had raised an extra nine billion pounds in tax. I didn’t see the coalition doing that, I saw the people in this room doing that, leading an organisation that, however hard they seem to make it for us, delivers year-on-year good solid results. It’s about time that not only our employers but the government actually realise the value of what we do, looked at a proper remuneration package to reward us properly, and looked at paying us for the skills which, quite frankly, are going to be more valued outside as the economy picks up.” Calling for an effort to fix the pay gap, John added “We are different from all the other government departments because we bring in the money that funds those other government departments.”

Neither motion attracted any opposition and both were clearly passed on a show of hands.

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FIRST TIMERS

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Ross Starkie & Stewart McKie

Reception & A

H

aving never attended the ARC AGM before I was interested to see what happened and what it was all about.

It was nice to know that there was a great social aspect too.

Upon arriving in London on Tuesday afternoon it was a quick change at the hotel before heading out to the first social event, the quiz.

This was a difficult quiz, luckily in our team there was enough people to balance out my lack of pub quiz knowledge! This night was a great way to catch up with current colleagues as well as meet others for the first time before the AGM in the morning. What is not to like about chatting over food and drinks. A particular highlight was the ‘who looks like who in the committee past and present’, which was very entertaining especially having only been in ARC and HMRC a short time. The rest of the days at AGM did include looking for a Peter Griffin look alike and other such famous folk.

The quiz was the perfect icebreaker for new ARC members, giving other friendly faces to look out for in the following days, especially only knowing a select few people from ARC Liverpool.

Following Thursday’s AGM was the ARC Dinner. Arriving at the venue we were greeted with a wonderful champagne reception and a lovely venue. Some of us even managed to get a free second glass (Amy Carr, I’m looking at you).

The atmosphere was great and as a ‘newbie’ it was great to see some of the faces from the previous night’s events. Whilst being called through for dinner and finding my place at the table, it was clear that the setting was great: wine on the tables ready and food was soon served, we chatted away for the evening.

After-dinner speakers shared their wisdom and thoughts on the department and where it’s going I then had more time to mingle amongst the guests.

Doing the rounds chatting to lots of different people I even managed to catch some time to talk to Lin Homer. The time to chat to different people was a great way to network and understand others roles within the department. I feel this time gave a way to further develop a ‘one big team’ attitude as people understood pressures, influences and challenges within different areas of the department.

Moving on from the dinner venue a large number continued to socialise in a nearby bar.

Getting to know some of the other new trainees that had attended was good and gives more friendly faces in more locations moving forward in my career. I look forward to hopefully attending next year and will do my best to convince more trainees to turn out to ARC AGM than this year.

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incapable of curing the problem, forcing ARC to resort to the Employment Tribunal. Helen BairdParker, who leads ARC’s equal pay team, proposed for Committee. She began by updating the AGM on developments since the last arcnews and Information ARC updates. We were involved with directions; the case would take a long time to come to decision point. But, she added, “this is the best shot that we’ve got of getting a pay rise for everybody, so if we’re successful here HMRC will have to look again at its pay system. They’re not going to do that quickly; it’s cheaper for them to string us out in this litigation than it is to give us all a fair and proper pay system, so unfortunately that’s where we’re at.”

MOTION 33 from London Euston Centre brought in the question of age discrimination, drawing attention to the large, and increasing, number of new entrants doomed to languish near the bottom of Grade 7 with little prospect of advancing up the scale. It called on Committee to consider, by 2017, whether these matters should not also be addressed by Employment

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Tribunal applications. I moved on behalf of my Centre, accepting that the sex discrimination cases were the major attack at present, but pleading on behalf of the original mover, and those like him, who faced the prospect of choosing between no effective pay rises for several years or leaving for the private sector.

Helen Baird-Parker, responding for Committee to MOTION 33, expressed sympathy. Committee had looked at age discrimination when considering our current challenges, but the case had not been as strong.

Promising to continue to look at age-related issues, she also assured members:” The thing is, also, that our sex discrimination claim should fix this problem for everybody, so if we get a decision in these we should have this fixed by 2018 anyway. So we shouldn’t then need to look additionally at age because the pay system will be changed for everybody.”

Mark Bingham from Northern Ireland Centre got up to say that

MOTIONS 27-35: PAY

& ARC Dinner

We then moved to two motions (also in common debate) on equal pay. MOTION 32 from Committee, reconfirming ARC’s commitment to our challenge to the department on indirect sex discrimination, applauding the volunteers for our test cases and pointing out the inequity of a pay system which is inherently

the recent election had given him some hope, a more progressive MP having been elected for his constituency. He suggested that newer, more progressive MP might be more amenable to lobbying on diversity grounds, and might respond to the problem of our pay system. He urged support for both motions.

Andy Nixon from Glasgow

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ments for professional expertise or qualifications. Leicester had then amended their own mo-

that, in trying to use OECD jargon, they had got it wrong, since the comparable uncontrolled price was actually the salary offered by the big four – far in excess of even the enhancement to the scale maximum offered

by HMRC. “At a time when BEPS and DPT have become the battleground for avoidance, by paying our tax professionals significantly less than the going rate for the job the government seems to be sending out a strong signal that it does not take international tax avoidance seriously.” The motion was carried easily on a show of hands.

The final MOTION [35] in the pay debate came from Leicester Centre and condemned pay-

and pleading “what we’re trying to say here is that can you please grade the jobs properly, pay the proper rate for the job, recruit and retain properly; don’t go offering special payments hither and thither just to plug holes.

Just pay everyone the proper rate for the job please.” Paula Houghton for Committee supported the motion as amended.

Committee had no intention of going out to secure a discriminatory pay system, but they also did not want a mandate preventing them from seeking, or accepting, payments for specialist skills in justified circumstances.

The President put the motion to the vote and it was passed easily as amended.

MOTIONS 27-35: PAY

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Centre described himself as “Grade 6, on the max, working with people who are doing the same job as me for a long time, who are being paid considerably less than me. Why? Because of a pay system which is discriminating on the basis of age.”

MOTIONS 32 AND 33 were then both carried easily on a show of hands.

MOTION 34 from Glasgow Centre noted the recent advertisements for external recruits to do Transfer Pricing work, offering the possibility of starting higher pay up to the Grade 6 maximum. The motion said that, by so doing, HMRC was establishing ‘a comparable uncontrolled price for this work’ and thereby possibly inviting current employees doing the same work for less to leave. Neil McFarlane, in moving for Glasgow, confessed

tion to avoid the idea that any kind of professional supplement must be refused. Alan Bamford explained this first, anticipating that the amended motion would not attract Committee opposition

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Building Our Future

Becky Conroy from North East Centre moved MOTION 38, which called for ARC members presenting or facilitating at BOF events to be better supported by HMRC in terms of feedback and support so they could respond to questions and challenges thrown at them in the course of BOF events. She took a quick straw poll, and unsurprisingly was far from the only BOF facilitator/presenter in the room. This was Becky’s first time at conference despite, she told us, having been an ARC member for fifteen years. So it was also her first speech to an ARC conference.

She hung around at the rostrum to move MOTION 39 [typical, wait fifteen years then two speeches come along at once!].

This motion sought to ensure that BOF wasn’t used as a mechanism to bypass trade union involvement in the departmental change programme.

Emma Stearman from the

North East Centre came to move MOTION 40 (BOF obviously being a big thing in Geordieland) seeking Regional Centres to offer real decentralisation and proper career opportunities [sorry, I can’t see that phrase without hearing Joe Strummer’s voice in

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my head singing “the ones that never knock”] outside London.

Next on the order paper was the “phantom” motion from Sheffield, number 41. Phantom in the sense that it was never moved, because nobody from Sheffield attended to move it.

Nevertheless, I’m going to mention motion 41 here, because its sentiments deserve an airing. It called on committee to put forward to ExCom the arguments of members outwith the likely Regional Centres as regards shutting offices, and expressed concerns about loss of experience, inconvenience to members, and the possible adverse effects on compliance in areas where HMRC would have no visible presence going forward.

And most poignantly, it asked HMRC to show us the numbers underpinning all of this. Sheffield, where were you??

John Parkhouse from com-

MOTIONS 38-41: BUILDING OUR FUTURE

MOTIONS 38-41

mittee assured conference that committee was in tune with all of the motions debated, and told everyone “we’re working on it for all members wherever you are.”

Peter Horne from London

BCD shared his experiences of BOF with conference. His main point was that the BOF materials showed ExCom didn’t seem to have a good grasp of the geography of southern England (so what chance do the rest of us have??).

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2015 Annual General Meeting

KEYNOTE ADDRESS

Bernadette Smith LEGAL AND GOVERNANCE

H

i, thanks for letting me have a couple of minutes. I’m Bernie Smith and I’m from Legal and Governance, but I’m just here to talk about the Living Wage campaign.

I was here two years ago and this conference gave us a mandate to go away and try and help achieve the living wage for HMRC cleaners, and around that time the FDA became an accredited living wage employer as well so that was really great.

We have been working on this for the last couple of years. Last year we had an action across Whitehall with the Living Wage Foundation, when cleaners from a lot of different government departments presented letters to their ministers asking those ministers to meet with them and

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discuss the living wage and one of the outcomes of that was that at DEC they now pay their cleaners the living wage. Our cleaners from our HMRC buildings wrote a letter asking Lin Homer for a meeting to discuss this and HMRC didn’t even receive the letter; and they put out a statement saying that matters of cleaners’ pay were nothing to do with them and that it was a matter for the cleaning company and the cleaners, and it was a private issue. So the cleaners that were working with us, that were working on that action, the HMRC cleaners were pretty disappointed and disillusioned. They work such long hours, they don’t have much spare time and they said ‘you know, we’ve given all our time for this and nothing’s happened’. So I think I feel like now is the time for us civil servants to step in there and really keep the campaign going moving forward.

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So I’m back now – I’ve been on maternity leave – but I’m back doing this campaign.

One of the civil servants who was working on the DEC campaign has come to join us as well at HMRC, and also our comrade Terry Cook, who’s now retired. When he can he’s working with us on this as well. So we’re back and what we want from civil servants now is we want to do a bit of awareness raising, so I’ve been standing at the back today and I was talking to a couple of colleagues earlier and they said they weren’t even aware that HMRC cleaners didn’t receive the living wage and I think probably a lot of people aren’t aware of that. So if you want to support this please do come and talk to me and I can talk to you about what you can do in your building, putting up posters and generally raising awareness.

But otherwise please, if you want to talk to your colleagues about this, tell them that our cleaners don’t get the living wage, tell them that a lot of our cleaners in our buildings have to work seven days a week, and work split shifts – a mornings shift and then an evening split shift somewhere else – just to make ends meet. A lot of our cleaners have to leave their house at four in the morning or five in the morning – because they have to get a bus to work, because they can’t afford to get the tube – so that they can arrive for their shift at 6am. So please speak to your colleagues and come and support us so that when the next time comes that we go to the minister and we go to David Gauke and ask him for the living wage – and let’s face it it’s not a natural Tory policy – but what we want to say is ‘we’ve got the support of our senior civil servants in HMRC behind our cleaners’ so please help us with that

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David Cooper from committee spoke to put Sheffield’s case – the fifth largest city in the UK could potentially be left without any HMRC presence. David didn’t think we needed to wait for BOF to take place, “trust me it’s happening now” he told conference. He compared the possible consequences with what happened when Hartlepool office in his neck of the woods closed – Hartlepool became a tax-free zone.

Tim Lintott from Brighton

then spoke, disappointed he couldn’t support the fallen Sheffield motion, but he referred movingly to the commitment to their work he had seen from staff in non regional centre locations.

Sarah Guerra, a former officer

and committee member then spoke and offered an alternative point of view as a member of the BOF team – she reminded conference that BOF was separate from the Workforce Management Programme and the department’s location strategy,

MOTIONS 38-41: BUILDING OUR FUTURE

“The HMRC cleaners were pretty disappointed and disillusioned. They work such long hours, they don’t have much spare time and they said ‘you know, we’ve given all our time for this and nothing’s happened.”

and assured conference that HMRC was definitely listening to what the staff said in BOF sessions.

This was a lengthy debate – Steve Dodd from Leeds Centre and Paula Houghton from

committee also spoke. Steve made the very pertinent point that there was or ought to be a great opportunity here for ARC to influence things, and Paula had her parochial hat on from Norfolk and Suffolk Centre to say she wasn’t impressed at the suggestion that colleagues in areas where offices might close had a wider duty, in delivering the BOF message, to those who might keep their job in a regional centre location. Someone with a better knowledge of the war poets than me would, I am sure, come up with a suitable line or two from Wilfred Owen or Siegfried Sassoon. Words, however, fail me. Paula closed by telling conference she could undoubtedly fly to Edinburgh and stay in a hotel all week before flying home on a Friday, more cheaply than she could commute from Ipswich to London every day.

Motions 38 to 40 were passed.

I’ll speculate that motion 41 would have similarly passed.

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MOTIONS 42-47

Hills pointed out the dearth of

Locations

the phrase “fait accompli” but everyone knew that was what he was talking about. Martin McGuiness from North East

2015 Annual General Meeting

Amy Carr from Liverpool moved MOTION 42, a plea for decent career paths outside London. She was followed by Vicky Johnson from West Midlands Centre moving MOTION 43, a plea for decent career

paths outside London. Former President Graham Black then moved MOTION 44 for Glasgow Centre, a plea for… you get the drift .

SCS posts in the parts of the United Kingdom where people don’t wear white shirts that have red roses or three lions on them… Steve McFarlane

from committee wanted to reassure conference that committee was “going to formulate a plan” and was “already thinking very hard about it.”

In all of that ARC’s aim would quite simply be “to do the best for our members in places where there might not be an office for them to go to any more and also in the regional centres where there will be an office.”

Motions 42 to 44 were all passed.

MOTIONS 45 AND 46 were taken in common debate.

Mike Simmons from Leices-

Centre moved MOTION 46, telling conference that members in non-Regional Centre locations needed support and information. Given that Martin works in Benton Park View he clearly had no personal axe to grind here. Good on you, Martin. Christine Suddaby

of Leeds Centre made two significant points – firstly she worked in the largest office in the orbit of her likely regional centre, which had barely been referred to in BOF conversations; and secondly that the positioning seemed already to be happening.

Unsurprisingly, conference passed both of these motions.

Next up was Jane Hodgson

There wasn’t a lot of debate about these motions, because there wasn’t a lot of controversy about them. Mick Lett

name-checked his pal with the sickle (again – inevitably!) and former President Gareth

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ter Centre moved MOTION 45 which talked about the fact that some parts of HMRC seemed already to be acting like they knew where the Regional Centres were going to be located and were filling vacancies on those assumptions. Mike didn’t actually use

from Preston Centre to move MOTION 47. Jane made an impassioned plea relating to work/life balance and commuting times, should the re-

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to this on behalf of committee and empathised with the Preston motion, whilst admitting to a vested interest, as he too worked in an office which was also likely to be erased from the map. And in case anyone thought committee wouldn’t do anything about this, he reckoned another six members apart from himself would be in a similar position.

Motion 47 was carried.

Estates

Motion 48 was passed.

Andy Nixon from Glasgow

Centre moved MOTION 49, which called for BOF not to be used as an excuse not to repair problems in the department’s existing estate. Andy picked a list of typical problems and told conference “any decent employer” would make sure a list of common building problems would be rectified tout suite. No dissent and no debate here, but definitely plenty to ponder. Motion 49 was passed by conference.

MOTIONS 50-52

Organisation & Communication With conference moving rapidly towards the end of the

Gareth Hills from Bristol Centre moved MOTION 51,

in tune with this motion last year, Graham Flew – possibly

praising the campaign work done by ARC over the last few years and asking committee to continue with the public awareness process, as a priority going forward. Gareth painted a bleak picture of how the new government is likely to (continue to) treat public servants and urged committee to keep up the argument for a properly resourced and fairly-paid HMRC, as a critical factor in reducing the tax gap.

Gareth’s rallying call drew more than one round of applause from conference and the motion was of course enthusiastically passed.

The final motion was MOTION 52 from Leicester Centre talking about building capability within committee, and basically a re-run of a motion the centre put forward in 2014. This was moved by Mike Simmons, and although committee was not entirely

a little demob-happy at the prospect of conference finishing nearly an hour ahead of schedule – responded to say that committee didn’t mind it this year. So Motion 52 also passed.

ARC President Tony Wallace closed conference with the usual remarks, thanking those who had assisted the running of it, plus of course everyone who attended the AGM, to make it what it is. So that was the end, for 2015 AGM at least of what Tony called his “shouty Scottish voice” and he finished in the hope that everyone would enjoy themselves at the evening’s dinner.

MOTIONS 42-52: LOCATIONS; ESTATES; ORGANISATION AND COMMUNICATION

gional centres proposals lead to the closure of HMRC’s offices in Preston. Apart from the huge potential loss of experience which might ensue from the department’s proposed retrenchment, Jane pointed out that some ARC members in her centre were already suffering long commutes as a result of previous office closures. Jane also thought that businesses were pre-empting the eventual HMRC decisions.

Steve McFarlane responded

MOTION 48 from South Wales Centre was under the heading of Estates, and in moving it Tamsin Wallbank made

reference to the utterly unacceptable fifteen minute travel time within the site for her to get to a vending machine for a bar of chocolate. The serious point to Tamsin’s motion was the time spent by senior members of staff in doing administrative tasks which didn’t need all the expensive training they had been given.

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agenda, Max Hacon from North East Centre moved MOTION 50, asking for improved communications about progress on conference motions. Paula Houghton from committee responded to say that committee would use existing channels to do just that, augmented soon by new channels, including a new and more real-time orientated ARC website. Motion 50 was passed.

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SPECIAL SUPPLEMENT

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KEYSTONE FIRST MIDDLE MIDDLE

Introducing H

opefully you will all have seen and heard quite a bit about Keystone by now. But just in case, here is a quickQ&A.

What is Keystone?

Keystone is the new section for staff arcnews

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representing people at HO and SO grade across Government. After one of the best debates in many years at FDA Annual Delegate Conference, delegates decided almost unanimous to expand our union and welcome HO and SO colleagues into the wider FDA family.

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MIDDLE MIDDLE

Will HO and SO members in HMRC be part of ARC? Like ARC, Keystone will be a distinct constituency within FDA. Members of Keystone will enjoy an identity as a separate grouping organised as a unified body across the civil service. ARC, on the other hand, is organised as an employer based group working exclusively in HMRC. This means that our new colleagues, whilst being part of FDA will not be members of ARC. That said ARC and Keystone are both part of the greater FDA. We would anticipate our existing ARC members working closely with Keystone colleagues in local geographical centres. Members from both parts of FDA in local offices can work out how that will work best in practice but there is no reason why Keystone colleagues cannot be invited to come along to ARC Centre meetings in a nonvoting capacity. Indeed as Keystone grows and finds its feet members of Keystone may want to invite ARC colleagues to their meetings on the same basis.

Will existing HO and SO ARC members have to move to Keystone?

No, there are no plans to change the organisation of any existing part of FDA. Indeed on promotion, to Grade 7 we would anticipate Keystone colleagues moving across to ARC.

Is this about poaching members of any other union?

Absolutely not. The formation of Keystone was decided on by FDA members in response to a demand that many of us know is out there.

There are a lot HO and SO colleagues who are not currently 10

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applies for several places, including ARC and Managers in Partnership (MiP), a unique joint venture between the FDA and Unison, created to support senior managers in the NHS. MiP was set up in 2005 and has nearly doubled in size over a ten-year period.

Keystone will operate in the same way within the FDA’s federal structure and its success will help the union to grow in size and influence, to the benefit of all members.

OK, so how can I help make Keystone a success?

members of any union, many of them have asked if they can join us and those of you who have helped out at FDA Learn events will be particularly aware of this.

Those HO and SO colleagues recognise the benefits that come with being a member of FDA Our reasoning is simple. There is a demand from people who do not currently recognise a union that is attractive to them and which they are eligible to join. We are now giving those people an organisation which speaks for them in the way that they would like to be represented. Fundamentally this is about driving up union density and offering the best service we can to FDA members, new and current, and nothing else.

How will Keystone work?

One of the many strengths of the FDA is our federal structure. This allows sections to retain a strong, separate identity and autonomy in their own sphere of influence whilst remaining an integral part of the wider union. This

If Keystone is to succeed it needs your help. We want you to be an advocate for Keystone. Talk to friends and colleagues in HO and SO grades, let them know about Keystone and FDA. We all know HO and SO colleagues who have asked about joining FDA. Many of them feel they are in jobs which are closely aligned to ARC grade and want a focus on professional development as well as member benefits. I know lots of you have already been recruiting – keep up the good work!

The website is at www. wearekeystone.org.uk it’s really helpful and has all the information our new colleagues will need to get started, so just point them in that direction.

If you recruit a colleague, email rebecca@fda.org.uk giving the name of our new member and you’ll be entered into a monthly draw for an iPad mini. Rebecca can also send you some leaflets and posters for your office.

What if I’ve got questions?

If you can’t find something you need on the website, please contact keystone@fda.org.uk arcnews

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MEET THE COMMITTEE FIRST MIDDLE MIDDLE

Profiles

“I like fizzy wine, still wine (white) and gin, not all in the same glass.”

Vicky Johnson Committee member Where do I start? Well, firstly, a big thank you to everyone who voted for me. I was overwhelmed by the result and very grateful. It’s hard work and there’s lots going on but I’ve tried to step up and hopefully make a difference.

So who have you voted for? Well basically 50 year old who has been in the department for 29 years, but perhaps you would like to know more.

I joined Inland Revenue in 1986 as a direct entrant TOHG* in London Provincial 5 district based in Highland House, Manchester (it’s a hotel now). Here, I learnt the delights of concards, P2s, hand-written assessments and how to set up individuals on the first ever computers. I also learnt how to work Lloyds Underwriters and how to complete forms 930, these remain my favourite forms, so logical!

Before that I did two years at Sheffield University, studying chemistry and maths before deciding organic chemistry was completely baffling and leaving.

I remain convinced that playing rugby for Sheffield University ladies and the consequential socialising had nothing to do with the bafflement!

Then a year with a stockbrokers who kindly let me work in the back office while playing lip service to training me up to be a stockbroker. We’ll not dwell on that job, I left it to join Inland Revenue.

In 1991 I moved down to Birmingham and completed the Accounts Investigator Course in arcnews

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Birmingham 3 district in December 1992. I went on maternity leave in January 1993 and returned to work in September 1993 as an accounts investigation inspector in Solihull District. I branched out and did Schedule E income, VAT liaison, Working Family Tax Credit Compliance management and went on secondment to a charity helping disabled people into employment before starting Core Professional Training in 2002. Along the way I divorced, remarried and had two more children – not quite as straight forward as that but these things seldom are.

I joined ARC at the first available opportunity, 2004, when all the exams were passed and I was in consolidation. I attended my first meeting on pay later that year – I was one of two females in the room which in no way represented the ratio in the office, but it struck me that I should get more involved. So I did and following the formation of HMRC I became Centre Secretary for Birmingham Centre. I then had it renamed West Midlands Centre to reflect the whole Centre, because we cover far more than just

Birmingham.

Promotion to G7 in January 2006 saw me move to the Complex Personal Return Team and return to Personal Tax and then in 2010 to the best job I’ve done, Technical Advisor for Car and Fuel benefits, based in Personal Tax Customer Product and Process. A supportive manager and a successful few years led to a temporary promotion to G6 for three months to cover general benefits and then in February 2014 a permanent promotion to a G6 CRM role in (now) Large Business. Obviously there’s quite a lot more to this, it wasn’t all plain sailing and there were times when being able to speak to people in ARC kept me sane and able to see the way forward.

When I moved to PTCPP, I chaired the Senior Women’s Network, jointly with Kerry Singleton and Jane Andrews, which fuelled my interest in diversity and means I am now lined up to help Helen Baird-Parker with ARC’s diversity portfolio.

Highlights outside the office include reading and my new hobby, Body Pump at the gym up the road – Tuesdays, Thursday’s and Saturdays with Step Aerobics added twice a week too. This allows me to eat and drink what I like (that’s the theory) but also, having become slightly obsessed, makes me think if I don’t go I will wake up ten stone heavier the next day.

Some of you may also be aware that I like fizzy wine, still wine (white) and gin, not all in the same glass (though I could be persuaded to try a cocktail that included them).

Perhaps I should return to that in a later edition?

*TOHGTax Officer Higher Grade. I’m reliably informed this is the equivalent of an O Band now—Ed. 11

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MIDDLE MIDDLE

In some quarters Jeremy Burrows takes a look back through the pages of Quarterly Record, the magazine of the Association of Inspectors of Taxes.

1905

IN THE BEGINNING The First Annual Report of the Association of TaxSurveying Officers, for 1903-4, begins as follows.

In consequence of a resolution passed at a General Meeting of Surveyors, on 2nd November, 1901, a Provisional Committee was elected to draft a scheme for the constitution of an Association of Surveyors of Taxes, to take the place of the former Surveyorsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Committee, and to create a permanent organisation which should be representative of the Tax-Surveying Branch. At a Special General Meeting, held on July 26, 1902, the draft rules of the Association, drawn up in accordance with this 12

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resolution, were considered and adopted.

The objects of the Association are, briefly: a. To protect the interests of TaxSurveying Officers. b. To encourage social intercourse among the Members. c. To provide a Benevolent Fund.

In furtherance of these objects, numerous Meetings have been held by the Committee, Sub-Committees, and Advisory Councils in the Provinces, and a considerable amount of work has been accomplished. arcnews

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QUARTERLY RECORD MIDDLE MIDDLE

100 YEARS AGO: 1915

Early in the First World War, a number of members of Inland Revenue staff had enlisted; but the consequent damage to the tax-gathering ability of the department led the Board to prohibit further enlistment. This led to a rather awkward situation, as noted in the following piece which appeared in the Quarterly Record for January 1915.

The Inland Revenue Volunteer Training Corps It is regrettable that the militant

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spirit of the staff should receive no better encouragement at the hands of the War Office than has at present been vouchsafed. The able-bodied staff at Somerset House was prompt to organise itself into a Volunteer Training Corps and some 800 men, including some 120 Tax Surveying officers and clerks, have been devoting such leisure as they could spare to military drill, with the desire to render themselves efficient for home defence, since they have been forbidden more active participation in the campaign.

They are now met with a request that they shall make a written declaration of willingness to follow the recruitment sergeant whenever he shall call on them, and this declaration is a condition of their recognition as a home defence force. Clearly they are precluded from signing this declaration by the Boardâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s already issued order.

Thus by its War Office mouth the Government calls on the men to enlist and by its Inland Revenue mouth forbids them. We hope this anomaly will quickly be removed.

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50 YEARS AGO: 1965

50 YEARS AGO The Quarterly Record for January 1965 contained an article by “Peewit” under the title “Prophets Without Honour”, which included the following plea for the Association of Inspectors of Taxes to become more actively involved in campaigning for tax reform.

The Editorial for October 1964 tentatively discussed the A.I.T.’s proper place in the field of taxation reform.

Already the Board had canvassed a C.Y. basis for company assessments, the Labour Party had included in its election manifesto a drive against evasion and avoidance, and then the new Chancellor’s autumn Budget promised a new company tax to replace the old.

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“Fifty Years On” showed that even in 1914 members of the A.I.T. were urging: (i) abolition of the three-year average, (ii) Schedule D for farmers, (iii) loss relief under what are now Sections 341 and 342, (iv) scale allowances for wear and tear, and (v) various administrative simplifications.

That the A.I.T. has been well ahead of legislation appears also in the RECORDS of 1937 to 1939, and this far-sighted interest of members surely gives us as strong a claim to be consulted on fiscal policy as have trade unions, bankers, industrial captains, and the like.

There is at present an A.I.T. Parliamentary Sub-Committee but no contact between A.I.T. and Chancellor. As far as the writer knows, the A.I.T. has

never submitted the sort of memorandum that issues annually from other professional bodies.

One would not suggest that such a memorandum should do more than give independent emphasis to subjects believed to have been at least superficially considered by the Board or by the Chancellor.

The Board’s policy must be to get the right sort of priorities into the parliamentary time available, but it is only human nature that injustices appear less urgent, that priorities are suppressed, in the long battle of minuting, commenting, editing, and discussing, and in allocating the parliamentary time to fiscal matters. A succinct, first-hand, nonpolitical comment from the men in the field could have a national value.

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QUARTERLY RECORD FIRST MIDDLE MIDDLE

25 YEARS AGO: 1990

25 YEARS AGO A Special meeting of Committee was held on Wednesday 4 October 1989, and the minutes were printed in the Quarterly Record for March 1990. The General Secretary of the FDA, Liz Symons (now Baroness Symons) reported to Committee on progress with pay negotiations for Grades 5-7. To put the pay rise figures being discussed in context, RPI inflation was 4.9% in 1988, 7.8% in 1989 and 9.5% in 1990.

Liz Symons reported on the general negotiations on Grades 5-7 leading up to the present offer.

She explained that the negotiations

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had taken place in an increasingly difficult political climate which had prevented the negotiations from achieving the kind of settlement they would have wished. Despite every effort by the FDA to negotiate properly, the overriding cost constraint had been the dominant factor from the Treasuryâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s point of view. The Chancellor had insisted that the cost of the settlement should not exceed 8 per cent overall, and that the spine revalorisation should not exceed 6.5 per cent.

Against this constraint, FDA negotiators had managed to achieve some improvement in the form of

spine straightening above point 15 which would offer increases of roughly 7 per cent at Grade 6 level and 8% at Grade 5 level. If the FDA EC voted to accept the offer, these improvements would be made. If they did not so vote, then the likely outcome would be imposition of the 6.5% plus the London spine point from January with no improvement.

Liz Symons reported that although she was deeply disappointed with the outcome, she felt there was no alternative but to recommend acceptance in order to get the extra money on the table.

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LAST

Building our Future, or All our Yesterdays?

A SCS

Eugene Mitchell

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nother year older, another pay letter from HMRC and another year on the same salary. At least I’m achieving – so I must be doing something right. I really wouldn’t want to be in the low SCS group because people there aren’t eligible for an award. Oh! But then neither am I – my pay is above the median and so I remain on the same salary that I was on in April 2009. I could have been on a low marking for all those years and I would be no worse off. My wife thinks I’m crazy – I think she might be right.

I have come to the conclusion that the more things change the more they stay the same.

Expectations and responsibilities increase and every year we receive the same platitudes; we are thanked for our contribution to HMRC and expected to be cheerful in all circumstances. However with every year that passes; hearing the same message, being asked to deliver more, and receiving no salary increase in return it becomes increasingly challenging to deliver a positive message about the opportunities we all have to build the department of the future.

A department full of attractive careers within an organisation that really cares for its people.

I don’t doubt that we all mean what we say when we pass on messages of thanks to individuals for their efforts. But these words don’t really mean very much when they are not at all backed up by tangible reward. Actions speak much louder than words and for some of us at least the lack of action from the department is deafening. What we see from the organisation is inconsistent with the personal messages we all receive and give.

Getting back to the SCS 1 pay awards; at least there are people who are receiving something. The bonus given to those achieving tops for 2015 is £9,500, as it was in 2014 and 2013 and, as in each of those years, it “reflects the great performance achieved in HMRC in the last 12 months”. But what of

“I’ve been in the SCS since 2004 and in that time I’ve received the full suite of box markings (including a bottom mark in my first year ‘because that’s what promotees get’).”

the rest of us, what of the other 75% of SCS1 who have also contributed to the great performance of HMRC? Is the value of our performance worth nothing to the department?

That is certainly how it looks from the point of view of the vast majority of us who have once again, as the reward of our increased effort, arcnews

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Trainee Updates

LAST

Julie Blayney, Amy Carr, James Ewington and Spencer Munn.

been locked out of any increase in our pay.

I’ve been in the SCS since 2004 and in that time I’ve received the full suite of box markings (including a bottom mark in my first year “because that’s what promotees get”) and bonuses. I’ve never once had it explained to me, although I’ve asked, what it is that distinguishes my contribution from a colleague’s.

Whenever I have asked the question about what I should have done differently to have improved my, and the department’s, performance and so to have moved from “achieving” to “top” there’s never any specific practical advice. This is really starting to bug me because I don’t feel completely honest as a leader promoting the need to improve performance through coaching and mentoring when I know that there must be a wealth of examples of top performance that we’re not exploiting for everyone’s benefit. We’ve just received the details about the HMRC People Awards for 2015. We’re not scared to celebrate some people’s performances so what is it about the “Top” box markings for SCS that means that we don’t feel we can be transparent about those who have been awarded £9,500 and why?

This year, unlike those that have gone before, ARC were given no early notice of how the SCS award was being shaped and only learned of the award after it had been made. When the point was raised the response was that ExCom has full authority to decide the pay criteria for the pay awards. Nobody would argue with that any more than anyone would argue that ExCom don’t have full authority to decide where regional centres will be or how they should be shaped. The difference is that in the latter ExCom is consulting widely with staff to help inform their decision whereas with the former a conscious decision was made not to engage.

We really are unlikely, as an organisation, to move higher up the trust index when the department refuses to engage on difficult issues arcnews

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Review of TSP streaming process This is ongoing, with ARC involvement. Thank you to everyone who has contributed so far. Please get in touch if you haven’t already and have something you would like to add.

For the TSP13 trainees who have streamed there were some issues around DTA (when it was due, who would pay etc) however these have been resolved and a message on First Class on 10 August should make everything clear.

The importing business area are the ones to pay DTA. If you are moving between lines of business, check the rules to see if you’re eligible! If you have any problems in this area, please get in touch.

Modernisation of TSP This is another review happening at the moment. This is not so much looking at the content of TSP, rather the way in which it is delivered, and if the course can be improved upon. If you are invited to get involved, please do so. Again, if you have any concerns, get in touch.

Welcoming TSP15 The new cohort of TSP trainees (all 250 of them) are due to arrive in September. When they arrive please do speak to them – especially about ARC! The Welcome events are being held in Manchester this year in w/c 15 September, so encourage the trainees in your area to stick around for the ARC session

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LAST

COMMITTEE’S ROLES CONSULTATIONS, ARRANGEMENTS AND TEAMS NAME

Tony Wallace President

CONSULTATION/BUSINESS AREA (Lead in Bold)

PORTFOLIO

BUSINESS PLAN

Oversight

Chief People Officer

Strategic oversight

Chief Finance Officer

Stakeholder Management

Corporate Finance

Organisation & Recruitment

Corporate Communications

Terms & Conditions

CPO Finance

External tax group

CPO HR Policy & Operations

Facilities Time Pay, Ways of Working, Equal Pay

John Parkhouse Deputy President CLO – 100PS & Brighton

PT Change

Stakeholder Management

PT Process Transformation

Pay

BT Change

Terms & Conditions

E&C Change

Ways of Working

B&C Change

Change

Business Focus

CFO Organisational Development Helen Baird-Parker Officer CLO – Legal & Governance

Solicitors Office

Equal Pay

Sols-PT and Corporate Tax Services

Diversity and Inclusion

Diversity and Inclusion

Tax Litigation Sols-Business Tax Sols-Business change, caseworkers & Cross Cutting

Eugene Mitchell Treasurer CLO – Glasgow

Tax Assurance Commisioner

SCS

Finance

Treasurer

Oversight

HR – Tax Assurance Commisioner BT Operations Commisioners Advisory Accountant

Lawrence Hutton

Business Tax Lead

Jegs/Jesp/Applications

CLO-Hull & Leeds

BT, Financial Performance & Change

Member Engagement

External Stakeholders

External Focus

Benefits and Credits

Deputy Treasurer

Organisation

PT Operations

PMR

Customer Products and Processes

AGM

B&C Operations

Dinner

B&C Customer Strategy & Policy

Procedures sub Committee

Universal Credit

Facilities Time

B&C Finance

Casework support

Large Business BT-HR Iain Campbell Officer CLO – Edinburgh

Personal Tax PT Finance PT HR CDIO-Security &Information

Graham Flew Officer CLO – Cambridge & Leicester (Euston Tower, Temp)

B&C HR Mark George Officer

Enforcement & Compliance

Casework Lead

Counter Avoidance

Professionalism

Local compliance

PMR

Members Priorities

EC Finance EC HR

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LAST CONSULTATIONS, ARRANGEMENTS AND TEAMS NAME

CONSULTATION/BUSINESS AREA (Lead in Bold)

PORTFOLIO

BUSINESS PLAN

Vicky Johnson Officer

Chief Digital and Information Officer

Training and Professionalism

Members Priorities

Financial Operations CFO Finance Interrnal Audit Commercial Government Banking CDIO- Finance CDIO-HR Aspire CDIO-Account & Portfolio Management Member engagement

Blair Gardner Julie Blayney

SI/CI

arcnews

Business Focus

CLO – North East

SI

Diversity and Inclusion

Jim Rogers

KAI

Change

Members Priorities

CLO – Reading & South Coast

RIS

SRM

Members Priorities

CPD

Diversity & Inclusion

David Cooper

Mid size

CLO – Sheffield

SME

Eva Braniff

IT – Delivery

CLO – Northern Ireland

CDIO-Technology CDIO – Digital CDIO-Development, testing & operations

Jeremy Burrows

Debt Management & Banking

External Focus

CLO – Gloucester & Oxon & Bucks

Specialist Personal Tax

Diverstity & Inclusion

Diversity & Inclusion

James Ewington

HMRC Central Customer Strategy

External Focus

External Focus

CLO – West Midlands

Central Policy

Organisation

Amy Carr CLO – Preston & Liverpool

Tax Professionalism & Assurnace Paula Houghton

BT – Business Customer & Strategy

Organisation and Recruitment

CLO – Norfolk & Suffolk (South Wales, Temp)

BT – Corporation Tax, International and Stamps

T&S Presidents Office H&S

Steve McFarlane

BT – Customs

Business Workforce Management Business Focus

Indirect Tax Workforce Planning Frances Hunter

Tax Free Childcare

Green Issues

CLO – London BCD (South Wes, Temp)

ESS

Business Workforce Management

Spencer Munn

Civil Service Resourcing

External Focus

CFO-Change Programme Members below G7

Member Engagement

Training and Professionalism Will Richardson

arcnews

Members Priorities

CLO – Croydon

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Offers for ARC Members!

FDA Portfolio help’s you save valuable time and money.

FDA Portfolio encompasses the FDAs Legal, Financial and Discounts package.

There is no extra charge – all ARC members can access FDA Portfolio.

Highlights include:

Cashback on High Street Brands If you know that you’ll spend £400 a month at the supermarket each month, by pre loading your ‘My Cashback’ card, you will automatically be credited with extra cash, in your account, to be spent at that supermarket, or in any of the partner retail stores.

Save 15% on your current motor insurance Save 20% on your current home insurance An instant saving is available to all members – why don’t you give it a try!

Free Will Service Free standard Wills are available from our partners, Slater and Gordon.

Complimentary Financial Advice Consultation No obligation! From our partners, Lighthouse.

Plus, much more.

The FDA Portfolio Calculator can help you to discover how much money you can save. FDA Portfolio works hard to secure the very best rates and discounts for you. However, where you see our ‘Price Promise’, if you find a better deal elsewhere, we’ll challenge the provider to both match that rate AND add a little something extra in recognition of your time.

Please help to spread the word of FDA Portfolio among your colleagues. Non-members can take a look at the savings they could make if they join. Depending on their circumstances, the cost of ARC membership could be greatly reduced – or even free!

To find out more, visit www.fda.org.uk/FDAPortfolio

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