Race Relations (Amendment) Act:

Monitoring Report on Employment Issues: 2005/2006

1. Introduction
2. Employees
3. Recruitment
4. Promotion
5. Training
6. Performance Assessment
7. Disciplinary Action
8. Grievances
9. Employees Leaving the authority
10. Overall Conclusions
11. Appendices

1. Introduction

Amongst the duties introduced for public sector organisations by the Race Relations (Amendment) Act was the requirement to monitor specified aspects of their employment practices and to produce an annual monitoring report. This is the fourth such report to be produced by Tameside, and is now a key document in assessing and informing the Council's equalities performance in specified areas.

1.1 Range of monitoring required.

The legislation requires us to monitor, by their racial groups:

• Our employees
• Applicants for jobs, promotion and training

In addition, as we have more than 150 employees we also have to monitor:

• Training received
• Benefit or disadvantage from performance assessment
• Grievances
• Disciplinary action
• Ending employment with the authority

The ethnic categories that we are recommended to use for this purpose are those used in the 2001 Census. The Government's Best Value performance framework requires us to use those categories. It is possible for individual Councils to further sub-divide some categories, depending upon the ethnic groups in their locality. The Council has decided that there is no need to take this approach, given the composition of the local population.

For each requirement of the Act this report analyses:

• The way in which data is collected
• Any data collection issues that have been raised
• The results from the data, either as a snapshot at March 31st 2006 or during 2005/2006, as appropriate.
• Any issues raised by the analysis

2. Employees

2.1 Data collection

The Council's Personnel/Payroll system, Trent, includes information on the ethnicity of employees. The category in which the employee wishes to be shown under is collected along with other key information when an employee commences with the Council.

2.2 Data Collection Issues

As was noted in previous years, the classification system for ethnicity previously used did not conform with the 2001 Census categories, and it had been necessary to ask all existing employees to re-categorise themselves. It was always recognised that there would be problems in getting employees to respond and there have now been five separate initiatives. At the end of March 2006 data was not available for 14.3% of the workforce, an improvement on the 16.3% of the previous year.

2.3 Results

The situation at March 31st 2006 is shown in Appendix 2.

This covers all permanent and temporary employees (NB this is not identical to the definition used for the relevant Best Value Performance Indicators as this only includes temporary employees with more than 12months service) Whilst the results for the smaller Services (those with under 100 employees) are not statistically significant there are considerable variations. The overall outcome for the Council is that 3.8% of its workforce is from black and minority ethnic groups.

2.4 Issues raised

Clearly the Council wishes to have a workforce that is broadly representative of the locality it serves. The 2001 Census data makes it possible to draw this comparison. This shows that 5.2% of the economically active Tameside population aged between and 65 comes from black or minority ethnic groups. This compares with 3.8% of the Council's workforce. This does show that there is some way to go to having a representative workforce. However as was noted in previous reports Tameside has a more representative workforce than any other Greater Manchester Council.
NB Whilst data is not available for other Councils the Tameside situation is that 74% of its employees live within the borough.

3. Recruitment

3.1 Data Collection

The standard application form includes a section to collect equalities monitoring information from applicants. The recruitment administration system makes it possible to analyse the progress made by applicants.

3.2 Data Collection Issues

Information is not available for school-based jobs, where application forms are returned directly to the School concerned. For non-school jobs the system depends on completed recruitment monitoring forms being returned by Managers.

3.3 Results

Appendix 3 has details of the recruitment analysis. The crucial measure is the "equality ratio" ie comparing the percentage of successful applicants from each group.

3.4 Issues Raised

As noted above, the crucial measure is a comparison of the percentage of total applicants for each ethnic group who are appointed. This "Equality ratio" should be as close to 1to1 as possible, but a range between 0.9 and 1.1 to 1 is generally taken to be acceptable. In 05/06 the BME:White equality ratio is 0.75:1 which clearly falls outside the desired change. There has also been a considerable increase in the number of applicants who did not provide any information on their ethnicity, which is puzzling: It is unclear why the position should have changed so markedly.

4. Promotion

4.1 Data Collection

We have defined promotion as the "movement of existing employees to a new post on a higher grade than the one they currently occupy". Data on promotion should be obtained from Trent but implementation issues have prevented its collection in 05/06

4.2 Data Collection Issues

The legislation and the associated CRE Guidance do not have a definition of Promotion. For personal or career reasons it is possible to move to a higher grade but with reduced hours, to a lower grade but increased hours, from a temporary job to a lower graded permanent job and so forth. In any of these cases the employee may perceive that they have been promoted. It is also possible for an employee to be "promoted" without changing post, via a specific re-grade or as part of a re-structure.

It can also be argued that the intention behind the monitoring requirement was to analyse the impact of the employee deciding who should be promoted, rather than the system of open competition via a recruitment process that is the norm in local Government, and that Councils will not be required to report on "promotion" as such. Manchester City Council take this approach, for example.

Tameside had taken the approach of categorising employees taking up a higher graded post as "promotion" - transitional issues linked to the implementation of the new HR/Payroll system mean that this data is not available for 2005/6

4.3 Results

Not available

4.4 Issues Raised

Work has been carried out with other GM HR teams to explore the definitional problems. Given the range of approaches it has been decided to approach the CRE for what should be a definitive view.

5. Training

5.1 Data Collection

The data is obtained from evaluation forms completed by delegates and input to the Organisational and Employee Development teams course booking/training administration system.

5.2 Data Collection Issues

Data is not available on any training event not organised corporately. This will include any training organised by Schools or by individual Services. Monitoring is not currently carried out of requests for training by ethnicity. The Trent system currently being implemented can be developed be able to produce this data.

5.3 Results

The data for 05/06 is in Appendix 4.

5.4 Issues Raised

The 05/06 data and the outcomes in previous years show that we train a slightly higher proportion of our BME workforce compared to our white workforce. One explanation may be that this reflects the relative lack of BME employees in those occupational groups (ie ex manual workers) who receive less training than those who need continuous professional development or specific updating.

6. Performance Assessment

The Council's Employee Development review scheme ensures that every employee has a one to one review with their manager on an annual basis. The review focuses on work targets from the previous year, targets for the current year, evaluation of any training received in the previous year and identifying training needs for the current year.

This assessment is not a forum for decisions on promotion/demotion or any pay issues.

The new Trent system currently being implemented will be able to produce information on the EDR process and the ethnicity of employees

7. Disciplinary Action

7.1 Data collection

The workload monitoring system within Human Resources gives us data on employees who have gone through the disciplinary process. HR data will not cover employees who have been given an oral warning. The ethnic grouping data is obtained from the employee's record on the Personnel Information system

7.2 Data Collection Issues

The data does depend on Human Resources being informed of and subsequently involved in a disciplinary case. Within the current disciplinary procedure and the close relationship HR maintains with service managers it is possible but unlikely that some cases are not being recorded.

7.3 Results

The data for 2005/2006 is in Appendix 5.

7.4 Issues Raised

Given the small number of cases no clear conclusions can be drawn, although the results for all three categories are more or less identical. Aggregating the results for the four years for which data is now available shows no significant variation between ethnic groups.

8. Grievances

8.1 Data Collection

The workload monitoring system within Human Resources gives us data on employees who have gone through the grievance process. HR data will not cover employees who have been only reached the "informal" stage.The ethnic grouping data is obtained from the employee's record on the Personnel Information system

8.2 Data Collection Issues

The data does depend on Human Resources being informed of and subsequently involved in a grievance case. Within the current grievance procedure and the close relationship HR maintains with service managers it is possible but unlikely that some cases are not being recorded. A more complex issue is categorising the outcome of individual grievances, as there is no clear-cut way of determining "success" or failure. HR will explore if there is any way of categorising outcomes.

8.3 Results

The data for 2005/2006 is in Appendix 6.

8.4 Issues Raised

The small number of cases makes it difficult to draw any conclusions from a single year, but aggregating the results for the four years for which data is now available shows no significant variation between ethnic groups.

9. Employees Leaving the authority

9.1 Data Collection

"Reason for leaving" data is held on the Trent.

9.2 Data Collection Issues

Whilst the data will be robust for those categories in which the Council initiates the process eg dismissal, employees are not required to give a specific reason for leaving.

9.3 Results

The data for 2005/2006 is in Appendix 7.

9.4 Issues Raised

There are some variations between ethnic groups, but as our BME employees have a lower average age they are less likely to take the retirement or early retirement route and this also makes the voluntary resignation outcome higher for this group.

10. Overall Conclusions

As noted in previous monitoring reports there are still some issues with the data available for analysis. The Council cannot require employees or job applicants to provide all relevant information, but further work is still required to improve the quality of the data available for analysis.

Appendices

• Appendix 1 - Employees who have not provided ethnicity data
• Appendix 2 - Workforce: all permanent and temporary employees at 31/3/06
• Appendix 3 - Recruitment Monitoring: Employees recruited in 05/06
• Appendix 4 - Training Delivered 05/06
• Appendix 5 - Disciplinary Action: Cases Resolved in 2005/6
• Appendix 6 - Grievances: Cases Resolved in 2005/6
• Appendix 7 - Leavers during 2005/6

Appendix 1 - Employees who have not provided ethnicity data

Appendix 2 - Workforce: all permanent and temporary employees at 31/3/06

Appendix 3 - Recruitment Monitoring: Employees recruited in 05/06

Appendix 4 - Training Delivered 05/06

Appendix 5 - Disciplinary Action: Cases Resolved in 2005/6

Appendix 6 - Grievances: Cases Resolved in 2005/6

Appendix 7 - Leavers during 2005/6