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NJC/01/11

 

Employers’ Secretary, Sarah Messenger

Local Government House, Smith Square,

London, SW1P 3HZ

Telephone 020 7187 7335

e-mail: [email protected]

 

Employees’ Secretary, Matt Wrack

Bradley House, 68 Coombe Rd

Kingston upon Thames  KT2 7AE

Telephone 020 8541 1765

 

 

NATIONAL JOINT COUNCIL

FOR LOCAL AUTHORITY

FIRE AND RESCUE SERVICES

________________________________________________________________________

 

To:           Chief Fire Officers

                Chief Executives/Clerks to Fire Authorities

                Chairs of Fire Authorities

                Directors of Human Resources at Fire Authorities

               

Members of the National Joint Council

               

________________________________________________________________________

 

11 January 2011

 

CIRCULAR NJC/01/11

 

Dear Sir/Madam

 

PART-TIME WORKERS (PREVENTION OF LESS FAVOURABLE TREATMENT) REGULATIONS - EMPLOYMENT TRIBUNAL CASES

 

  1. Authorities are aware that a settlement in principle has already been agreed with the Fire Brigades Union.

 

  1. Since then considerable work has been undertaken with legal representatives to identify a mechanism to facilitate withdrawal of the approximately 12,000 (Fire Brigades Union) Employment Tribunal cases currently within the system across the UK in a manner which accommodates the needs of both fire authorities and the Fire Brigades Union.

 

  1. We write to advise you that formal agreement is now imminent and should be reached within the next week or so. The anticipated timetable is intended to ensure that settlement payments can be made within the current financial year. This target is dependent upon authorities and the Fire Brigades Union being in a position to provide the required data to the agreed independent third party, Popularis, as soon as possible.  Therefore, in advance of that formal agreement and in order that work on compiling this information can begin, attached is a summary of the data fields that all authorities, with the exception of London and Merseyside, will be required to complete and return in xls or csv format.

 

4.      The NJC has successfully used Popularis before to overcome the difficulties of one party exchanging individuals’ data with another and it will therefore be familiar to fire and rescue services and the Fire Brigades Union.

 

5.      Popularis is a data processor and as such it has a duty of confidentiality. It is also required under the Data Protection Act not to disclose any personal information to any third party. Popularis is named in Statutory Orders as eligible for appointment as an Independent Scrutineer.

 

6.      The processing by Popularis of data in relation to employees and former employees of Fire and Rescue Authorities is necessary both for the administration of justice and for the purpose of legitimate interests pursued by Fire and Rescue Authorities - that is the settlement of the terms and conditions claims and potential claims.

 

  1. Popularis will hold the data received for a short period after completion of the settlement process, and will then arrange for the data to be securely destroyed.

 

  1. Further information concerning how to forward the xls or csv file to Popularis with provided with the formal agreement shortly.

           

 

Yours faithfully

SARAH MESSENGER

MATT WRACK

Joint Secretaries

 

 

LOCAL AUTHORITY FIRE & RESCUE SERVICES

 

DATA FILE SPECIFICATION – FIRE AUTHORITIES

 

1.The NJC will require each Fire Authority with the exception of London and Merseyside (55 in total) to provide an identified file in xls or csv format with the following fields.

 

2.Each file will be saved as LOCAL FRA NAME.XLS or LOCAL FRA NAME.CSV.

 

3.In the covering email, please provide contact details for any queries regarding the data.

 

4.The file, which should be zipped and password protected, will need to be sent to an email address that will be notified alongside the formal agreement

 

5.It will also be necessary to send a file password by email or text. Details will be provided alongside the formal agreement.

 

DATA FIELDS:

 

Field No

Field Title

1

Title

2

Forenames

3

Surname

4

Address 1

5

Address2

6

Address3

7

Address4

8

Address5

9

Postcode

10

Date of Birth (dd/mm/yy)

11

National Insurance number

12

Rank/Role as at 30 June 2010

13

If no longer employed on 3 June 2010, rank/role on date service terminated

14

Employee Number

16

Employing Fire Authority

17

Date employment with employing fire authority commenced as a RDS firefighter

18

Date employment with employing fire authority terminated as a RDS firefighter (if applicable) IF still employed on 30/06/2010 enter "30 June 10"

19

Length of Service within the reference period as a RDS firefighter carried over from previous FRA (YY/WW)

20

Total length of service as a RDS firefighter in the reference period (YY/WW)

21

Level of cover provided at 30 June 2010, or if not employed on that date, level of cover provided on the date service terminated within the reference period

22

Amount of Compensation Payment

23

Deceased / Retired

24

Compensation includes consecutive service from another FRA   YES /NO

 

 

National Joint Council (NJC)