Brent Council Race Equality Award condemned

Following yesterday's revelation that Brent Council was a finalist for a Race for Opportunity award the organisation has received messages from local people about the council's record in this area. Here are two of them:

I am not sure why Race for Opportunity is surprised that BAME representation is decreasing when RFO itself is actively contributing to this state of affairs.

Black staff in Brent are reeling from the shock, as am I, of hearing that RFO has shortlisted Brent Council as a finalist for its RFO Award.

One only has to enter "race discrimination Brent council" in a search engine box to find out how the council's director of HR (acting in cahoots with her friend the chief executive, in further cahoots with the council's employment solicitor, aka director of HR's business and personal partner) was found guilty by an employment tribunal of race discrimination and victimisation of a black manager.

One has only to read some of the Wembley Matters blog articles to find out how disgusted Brent residents are at the council's total failure to investigate this HR director's wrong-doing and initiate disciplinary proceedings. LIN

All of the miscreants in this disgraceful case are desperate to redeem themselves on their CVs for their future employment prospects (the HRD left at the end of June with a payoff, nearly a year after the tribunal exposed her unacceptable behaviour, her partner has followed her and the chief executive's contract will be up some time this month.

They will undoubtedly be thanking RFO profusely that they can now say that they steered the council to being shortlisted for the award. Absolute shame on Race for Opportunity, an organisation that I have hitherto admired.

Googling stuff is so easy to do these days, RFO - not always accurate I know, but such a good idea to avoid promoting the very people that would be anathema to the professed RFO values. Even "Private Eye" has run parts of this dsgraceful story, so it seems only RFO is in the dark.

I will be copy- posting this blog piece on the Wembley Matters blog.

Nan Tewari
former Branch Secretary, Brent Nalgo (now Unison)

I write in disbelief regarding the the nomination of Brent Council for an award from your organisation....it's not April Fools Day yet is it??  Your spokesman is reported as saying that Brent puts " race equality at the heart of their activity"....ouch!!!  Are you aware of the following facts? 

1. Brent was found guilty of racial discrimination in the case of Rosemarie Clarke.   

2. The judge stated that Brent was guilty of bullying, intimidation and constructive dismissal.  

3.The decision in the case was so damning that the judge said that " Brent had no reasonable prospect of success" on appeal. Yet still Brent wasted Council taxpayer monies on fruitless appeals. 

4.The compensation award against Brent is likely to be made in September - perhaps coinciding with your awards ceremony. The exemplary damages are likely to be significant, and the total award against Brent is suggested to be between £500k and £1m.  

5. Brent engaged in a farcical internal review - led by Council Deputy Leader -of its H.R.practices after the case, despite calls throughout Brent for an independent review.   

I would ask you to reflect on your nomination. I am copying this e-mail to interested community parties. 

 Cllr John Warren

Brent's Muhammed Butt to be London Councils Equalities Lead despite racial discrimination finding

Despite the Employment Tribunal finding that Brent Council racially discriminated against an employee, victimised her and construcitvely dismissed her, Cllr Muhammed Butt, leader of Brent Council was appointed Equalities Lead by London Councils at their AGM yesterday.

No action has been taken against the CMT members named in the Employment Tribunal case.

Tories call for Brent Scrutiny changes following delegation refusal

Following the decision of the Scrutiny Committee last night to not allow the delegation from Philip Grant, unless he undertook not to mention the Employment Tribunal case involving Cara Davani, Cllr John Warren (Con, Brondesbury Park)  has issued the following statement.

The Scrutiny Committee has  yet again failed to do its job by rejecting a hearing of the Grant deputation on the Pavey H.R.report. It is another nail in its coffin.

Effective scrutiny must surely be challenging, controversial and "go where others do not go."  

Current scrutiny is useless with an ineffective Chairman....it simply has no credibility and does not hold the Executive to account.  I am proposing changes to the Constitution at the Council AGM on May 20, including the deletion of the current Scrutiny Committee.

My thoughts are along the lines that we need more scrutiny panels who will concentrate on specific areas of expertise, but I am open to any suggestions before I submit my proposals. 

The issues resulting from the high profile ET case cannot be swept under the carpet by a lame review.It is very undemocratic to deny Philip the chance to speak on, what any reasonable person would I think agree, issues that Brent has failed to address at every stage.

Cllr Reg Colwill (Con, Kenton) was on the Scrutiny Committee last night and  did not speak but appeared to go along with the decision not to hear Philip Grant's deputation.

Cara Davani and Christine Gilbert – Brent’s cover-up continues (or, another Deputation that the Council would not hear!)

Guest blog by Philip Grant

“Wembley Matters” readers may be interested to know what happened at Brent’s Scrutiny Committee meeting this evening (Thursday 30 April). 

Before it started, I was treated to the sight of Cllr. Butt sitting next to Cara Davani (Director of HR and Administration), laughing and joking with her, and pointing me out as the person who had come to present a Deputation about Equalities and HR. I don’t know why the Council Leader was there, except perhaps to impress on the committee members sitting opposite him that Ms Davani was under his protection, so they had better not do anything that might annoy her.

The Chair, Cllr. Aslam Choudry, soon got on to the question of the Deputation from Phil Grant, and said that there was a matter to sort out before I presented it. He asked for my agreement that if I were allowed to speak, I should not refer to any individual legal cases, as Brent’s Chief Legal Officer had advised me earlier in the day. 

I replied that I could not accept this restriction, for the reasons I had set out in an email sent to all of his committee members, and copied to the Legal Officer, some hours ago, which had not been answered. The legal case I wished to refer to was the one which Cllr Pavey’s review had been set up, as Christine Gilbert (interim Chief Executive, and also present) had announced last September, to learn the lessons from that case. As one of the points I wished to make was that an important lesson had not been learned, and both of the points required reference to the case in order to explain the reasons for what I wanted to say about the draft Action Plan, which Scrutiny Committee was being asked to give its views on, that case was relevant to committee’s consideration, and could not be ignored.

There was some further discussion with the senior Brent Lawyer, Arnold Meagher, at the meeting, who said that as the case involved had not been fully concluded, I should not be allowed to refer to it. I responded, saying that I would only be referring to “findings of fact” from the judgment in the case, and that judgment was final as it was no longer under appeal. I could not see how any reference to that part of the case would prejudice the position of any party to the remaining “remedy” hearing, at which the compensation award would be decided. I don’t think that this point was ever answered by Mr Meagher.

Cllr. Choudry said that he would discuss with his committee whether they should allow me to speak, as I would not accept the condition he had set out. There was a rather disjointed “discussion”, with several members of the committee speaking, but I could not follow what they were saying because they forgot to turn their microphones on. It seemed to be about the Legal Officer saying that I could not refer to the legal case I wanted to, but whether they viewed this as legal advice, or a legal instruction to the committee, was unclear. It appeared that the Chair was about to ask the committee to vote on the matter (which under Brent’s Standing Order 69(a)(i) he should have done, with only a simple majority being required to allow a Deputation to be received), but after further mumbled discussions Cllr. Choudry announced that I would not be allowed to present my Deputation, and moved on to the next item on the agenda.

Before leaving the meeting, I handed out the dozen printed copies of my Deputation I had taken with me to members of the public, co-opted members of the committee and other councillors present who wanted them, and I am setting out the text of what I would have said below, for anyone who wishes to read it.

Deputation to Scrutiny Committee on 30 April, in respect of item 9:
Cllr. Pavey’s Equalities and HR Policies and Practices Review and draft Action Plan.

I am speaking as an individual, but am aware that many local people, including Council employees and some Brent councillors, share the concerns I am raising.

In September 2014 an Employment Tribunal gave a judgment against Brent Council and its Director of HR, Cara Davani, finding that a former employee had suffered racial discrimination, victimisation and had been constructively dismissed.

Cllr. Pavey’s review of Equalities and HR policies and practices was set up ‘to ensure that we learn lessons from this case’. In the foreword to his review he says:

‘Policies are mostly sound. But policies are implemented by people and we need to do more to ensure that they are consistently applied.’

What Cllr. Pavey could not say, because his review’s terms of reference did not allow him to actually consider the Rosemarie Clarke case, was that an important lesson which should be learned is that even the best HR policies and practices are of little use if they are ignored by the officers who are supposed to follow them.

As an example, in guidance issued by Brent’s HR Director you can find statements like: ‘bullying and harassment will not be tolerated’. Rosemarie Clarke had raised a grievance against Cara Davani, because she felt she was being bullied and harassed by her. This led to a succession of acts of victimisation against her, recorded as findings of fact by the Tribunal, such as in para. 302 of the judgment:

‘'The tribunal is satisfied that the action of Ms Davani in seeking the claimant's suspension when she did, was a direct consequence of the claimant having raised a grievance against her. The tribunal finds that the claimant was thereby victimised.'

There were other findings of fact by the Tribunal about total failures to follow HR policies, which provided evidence of Brent’s constructive dismissal of Ms Clarke. Para. 176 of the judgment says:

'The tribunal finds that, from the correspondence from Ms Gilbert on 21 February, addressing the claimant's grievance of 18 February, so as to conclude and dispense with the grievance, this was not in accordance with the first respondent's [Brent’s] procedure and a breach of contract.'

If the Senior Officers responsible for such findings ignore Brent’s HR policies, what example is that setting to the Council’s other staff? The Action Plan is totally undermined, because why should managers bother to put the policies into practice, when those at the top ignore them and get away with it? Even if disciplinary action was taken against more junior staff for policy breaches, they could argue at any hearing that it would be unfair to penalise them, when no action was taken against Brent’s Director of HR for far worse misconduct.

Scrutiny Committee may wish to ask Ms Davani why she did not do the honourable thing, and resign, following the findings of fact in the Rosemarie Clarke case. It may also wish to ask Ms Gilbert why she did not institute disciplinary proceedings against Ms Davani when she failed to resign. If, having heard anything those Officers wish to say, committee members agree that the Equalities and HR Action Plan cannot move forward with Cara Davani still at Brent Council, I hope they will not be afraid to say so.

The second point I would ask Scrutiny Committee to consider is at Section 2 of the draft Action Plan [see page 5 of Appendix 2].  This has been prepared by Cara Davani, and is entitled ‘Achieving Excellence in Employment Policies’. 

I am deeply concerned at one of the “success criteria” which she proposes. This reads: 

‘Number of employment tribunals is low against benchmarked councils (benchmarks TBA) and ET cases are successfully defended.’

It is the second part of this that I find most worrying. “Success”, according to Ms Davani, should be measured by successfully defending Employment Tribunal cases. The risk of setting such a “target” is that it might encourage Council staff involved in these cases to fabricate or falsify the evidence that they give. 

As an example, in the Rosemarie Clarke case, a key factor in the finding of ‘racial discrimination’ against Brent Council was the decision to continue disciplinary proceedings against her after she had ceased to be a Council employee. In Para. 240 of the judgment it says:

‘With regards to the decision being taken to pursue disciplinary action against the claimant [Ms Clarke], following the termination of her employment, the respondents [Brent Council and Cara Davani] have been unable to state by whom or when that decision was made.’

As there would have been very few Council employees who could have made that decision, and at least some of those were witnesses at the Tribunal, this totally undermined the credibility of the Council’s evidence.

Scrutiny Committee may wish to ask Ms Davani and Ms Gilbert to tell them who did make that decision, and why. The stain of the ‘racial discrimination’ verdict against Brent Council cannot be removed, nor the Action Plan succeed, until a full and honest answer is given.

“Success” over Employment Tribunals is having none, and to achieve this I would recommend that the “criteria” should be: 

100% of managers honour in practice the core value set out in Cllr. Pavey’s review:
‘Every Brent Council employee deserves to be treated with dignity and respect.’ 

Thank you.

Philip Grant
30 April 2015.

Note from Martin Francis: Readers may be interested in seeing the Scrutiny Committee in action discussing whether Philip Grant should be heard. Unfortunately most councillors did not switch on their microphones so the public could not hear what was being said. Muhammed Butt is sitting with Cara Davani in the right hand corner of the horse shoe.

 

Brent Equalities and HR Action Plan under Scrutiny on Thursday

An important meeting takes place on Thursday which I hope will not be over-shadowed by the General Election campaign.

At 7pm the Scrutiny Committee, meeting at the Civic Centre, will be considering the Action Plan LINK that has been formulated as a result of the Pavey Review in Equalities and HR Policies and Practice LINK .

The Pavey Review was commissioned following the Employment Tribunal case which found Brent Council and Cara Davani (Head of HR) guily of racial discrimination, victimisation and constructive dismissal.  Interim CEO Christine Gilbert was also named in the Judgment. However the Pavey Review did not set out to look at this particular case.

Brent Council rather than take any action over the personnel involved decided to go to appeal but a Judge ruled that such an appeal had 'no prospect of success'. LINK

The Report going before the Scrutiny Committee is in the name of Christine Gilbert and Cara Davani LINK 

The public and press can attend the meeting.

Opposition amendments for tonight's Brent Full Council Meeting

A Council with a huge majority needs an opposition, even if it a Tory one. Tonight the Brondesbury Park Tories will move a budget amendment which would reduce the Council Tax by 2.5% and that they claim would also protect front-line services.

Further details of how they think they would achieve this should be available at Full Council.

They are also tabling an amendment to Item 8 on Pay Policy:

Key Strategic  Aims of HR Strategy for 2015/2019.......

To add  "adopting a zero  tolerance approach to bullying, intimidation and harrassment of staff by fellow staff members."

In addition Cllr John Warren has submitted the following to the Mayor:

 Mr.Mayor, 

              I have been approached by Brent residents who are unable to make a deputation
tonight, as that is not an agenda item.

        The urgent business is as follows......" To allow the Leader of the Council the opportunity to reply to two urgent questions raised by the recent high profile Industrial* Tribunal case....

1.How can staff have confidence in the latest round of job cuts when it is presided over by senior officers responsible for staff victimisation,racial discrimination and failing to follow the Council's HR procedures......as per.the same Industrial Tribunal judgement?

2.Why is Cllr.Butt still " protecting " the officers in this case? "

 *Should be Employment Tribunal (MF)

Another Deputation that Brent Council will not hear - important questions for Cllr Butt on senior officers and the Employment Tribunal case

Guest Blog by Philip Grant 

Three weeks ago “Wembley Matters” carried a guest blog from me about the lack of action taken by Brent Council against Cara Davani and Christine Gilbert for their parts in the victimisation, racial discrimination and constructive dismissal of Rosemarie Clarke. LINK  This included a letter which asked the Leader of Brent Council, Cllr. Muhammed Butt, two important questions. The “Brent & Kilburn Times” published the same letter, in a slightly edited form, on 12 February.

On 19 February our local newspaper carried a letter from Cllr. Butt, saying that ‘Brent Council is deeply committed to equality, diversity and fairness.’ It may even have been written for him by Cara Davani, as it is very similar in tone to her reports on Equality to this week’s General Purposes Committee, or Michael Pavey’s report on his HR policies and practice review. It makes a point of saying ‘We already have Investor in People Silver standard and are working out way to Gold’, without mentioning that it was Rosemarie Clarke, when she was Brent’s Head of Learning and Development, who actually achieved that IIP Silver Standard for the Council. It is perhaps ironic that Brent might already have reached the IIP Gold standard if Ms Clarke had not been constructively dismissed. However, Cllr. Butt’s letter did not answer the two questions I had asked him.

My disappointment that Cllr. Butt had side-stepped the real issue was eased when I saw that the “Democracy in Brent” webpage for speaking at Council meetings said that:
 
‘The programme of council meetings for the remainder of 2014/15 at which deputations are permitted’ included the Full Council meeting on Monday 2 March 2015. As the deadline shown for giving written notice of a deputation for that meeting was midday on Friday 20 February, I sent off my written notice to Brent’s Chief Legal Officer, Fiona Alderman, (and not to Fiona Ledden, whose defunct email address is still shown on Brent’s website as the place to send notices!) with an hour to spare. I heard nothing back from her, and wrote to query this when I saw on Tuesday that the agenda for the meeting on 2 March did not include an item for “Deputations”.

Ms Alderman has replied to me, saying:

‘The Council meeting in March is the budget setting meeting.  Standing Order 34 explains at (b) that certain items on the council agenda do not form part of the agenda items when the budget setting is considered. Deputations (Standing Order 37 (i)) are excluded items. Therefore, no deputations will form part of council business on 2^nd March.’

I have checked, and she is correct. It was the details on the Council website which were “in error”, and this is not another case of senior officers (or members?) wrongly preventing a Deputation from being presented to councillors. So, I am setting out here the Deputation which I would have made to Full Council next Monday, if I had been given the opportunity to do so. I will send copies of it to Cllr. Butt, and to all the other Brent councillors. Perhaps we will eventually get a full reply!

Two important questions for the Leader of the Council to answer.

I am speaking as an individual, but I know that the points I am raising are of concern to many local residents, Council employees and a number of elected councillors as well.

In September 2014 an Employment Tribunal gave a judgement against Brent Council and its HR Director, Cara Davani, finding that its former Head of Learning and Development, Rosemarie Clarke, had suffered racial discrimination, victimisation and had been constructively dismissed. [Paragraphs 1-6 and 313 of the judgement]

In respect of Ms Clarke’s suspension in February 2013, for alleged gross misconduct, the judgement says:

‘The tribunal find it to have been unreasonable of the respondents [Brent and Ms Davani] to suspend the claimant [Ms Clarke] when they did, which suspension this tribunal finds was sufficient to breach the implied term of trust and confidence; the factual matrix not supporting the allegations, which factual matrix Ms Davani had been fully aware of.’ [Para. 271]   and:

'The tribunal is satisfied that the action of Ms Davani in seeking the claimant's suspension when she did, was a direct consequence of the claimant having raised a grievance against her. The tribunal finds that the claimant was thereby victimised.' [Para. 302]

In respect of Ms Davani stopping Ms Clarke's sick pay in June 2013, the judgement says:

'… the tribunal finds no procedural basis for Ms Davani taking the action of stopping the claimant’s sick pay when she did,' [Para.310]   and: 

'In the absence of Ms Davani being able to give an explanation for taking such action when she did, the tribunal on a balance of probabilities finds that this course of action was taken by Ms Davani as a direct result of the antipathy the tribunal finds she had then had against the claimant, following the claimant having done the protected act [the grievance complaint], which this tribunal finds Ms Davani to have been incensed by.' [Para. 311]

The grievance which Rosemarie Clarke raised in December 2012 was against Cara Davani, her line manager, alleging bullying and harassment. Brent’s HR policies say that ‘bullying and harassment will not be tolerated’. Because she felt that her case was not being dealt with fairly, Ms Clarke made a formal grievance complaint to Brent’s interim Chief Executive in February 2013. The following extracts relate to how Brent dealt with this.

After setting out details from Brent’s HR procedures of what an employee should have been entitled to expect in such a case, the Tribunal found that:

 ‘The claimant was not afforded any of these.’ [Para. 175]  and:

'The tribunal finds that, from the correspondence from Ms Gilbert on 21 February, addressing the claimant's grievance of 18 February, so as to conclude and dispense with the grievance, this was not in accordance with the first respondent's procedure and a breach of contract.' [Para. 176]

Ms Clarke appealed by email against this summary dismissal of her grievance, and the Tribunal found:

‘The claimant chased up this email on 27 February, enquiring as to whether it had been received, Ms Gilbert responding stating that, it would be responded to as soon as possible.’ [Para. 196]   and:

‘The respondent has not responded further to the claimant’s correspondence. They maintain however, that a response had been drafted but not sent out, by mistake. The tribunal has not seen this correspondence.’ [Para. 197]

The Employment Tribunal judgement gives clear findings of fact, supported by detailed evidence, to show that Cara Davani victimised Ms Clarke over a number of months, and that Christine Gilbert, when the problem was brought to her attention, totally ignored Brent’s proper HR procedures. As a result of their actions, Brent will have to pay out a very large amount in compensation, damages and costs. Rosemarie Clarke had the courage to stand up to their bullying and indifference, and has been proved right to have done so.

The press release last September which announced the Council’s decision to appeal against this judgement says: ‘Brent Council takes all allegations of racial discrimination, victimisation, harassment or bullying extremely seriously.’ But the Council has done the complete opposite in this case, even after its appeal was thrown out last December because there were no reasonable grounds to support it. 

No action appears to have been taken against Brent’s Director of HR, or its interim Chief Executive, for their actions in this case, despite them being senior officers who are required to show high standards of conduct, promoting these ‘by leadership, and by example’, and by acting ‘in a way that secures or preserves public confidence.’

In a letter sent to Cllr. Muhammed Butt on 5 February, which was also published on a local blog site, and in a slightly edited form in the “Brent & Kilburn Times” on 12 February, I asked him two important questions. He has not yet answered them, so I ask him again:

1.  How can staff have confidence in the Council’s latest round of job cuts, when it is being presided over by two senior officers responsible for victimisation, racial discrimination and failing to follow the Council’s HR procedures?

2.  Why is Cllr. Butt still “protecting” these two senior officers, when he has known about their misconduct in the Rosemarie Clarke case since at least September 2014?

I hope that the Leader of the Council will now give the Council, its staff and Brent residents his full answers to these questions.

Philip Grant.

Two important questions for Cllr. Butt to answer

Guest blog by Philip Grant
 

This week’s “Brent & Kilburn Times” carries an article, “Council to revamp its equalities policies” on page 5. I am glad to see that, rather than simply repeating Brent’s press release about Cllr. Pavey’s review, the article also reminds readers about the Employment Tribunal case which gave rise to it, referring to ‘the treatment endured by Ms Clarke from her line manager, HR director Ms Davani’, and concluding:

‘Brent Council has refused to disclose if any disciplinary action would be taken against Ms Davani.’

After reading Cllr. Pavey’s report last weekend, I sent an email letter to the editor of our local newspaper, which I hoped would be published in the same issue as any story about the results of his review. Unfortunately, the “Brent & Kilburn Times” did not have room for it in this week’s edition, carrying instead (on page 15) two very good letters about vital services threatened by the Council’s proposed budget cuts. My letter included two important questions addressed to the Leader of Brent Council, Cllr. Butt, and as I believe these questions should be put to him publicly, I have asked Martin if he would “publish” my letter here. I know that Cllr. Butt may not be a “Wembley Matters” reader, but I will ensure that he, and his colleagues, receive a copy of this letter.

Dear Editor,

A lesson not learned by Brent's HR review

In September 2014 an Employment Tribunal found that former Brent Council employee, Rosemarie Clarke, had been constructively dismissed, directly discriminated against because of her race, and victimised by both the Council and its Director of HR, Cara Davani.

Brent Council responded by appealing against the Employment Tribunal judgement, and by asking its Deputy Leader, Cllr. Michael Pavey, to review its HR policies and practice ‘to ensure that we learn lessons from this case’.

In December 2014, a judge threw out the Council’s appeal as it had ‘no reasonable prospect of success’, because ‘none of the grounds disclose any reasonable ground of appeal’. The report on Cllr. Pavey’s review was presented to the Council’s General Purposes Committee last week. Although it shows that a great deal of effort has gone in to suggesting improvements to Brent’s HR and Equalities policies, the report does nothing about the key lesson which should have been learned from this case: that even the best HR policies and practices are of little use if the officers who should follow them are allowed to ignore them.

The detailed evidence in the Employment Tribunal judgement showed that the victimisation began after Rosemarie had the courage to complain about the bullying and harassment she felt she was suffering from her line manager, Ms Davani. It also showed that the victimisation continued over a number of months, and that interim Chief Executive, Christine Gilbert, failed to stop the victimisation when it was brought to her attention, or to follow the Council’s own grievance procedures, so that Brent was found guilty of breaching its employment contract with Ms Clarke.

The actions of these two senior officers have brought the Council into disrepute, as well as leaving it liable to massive compensation, damages and costs, but no action appears to have been taken against them. The Council Leader, Cllr. Muhammed Butt, does not appear to have made any public statement about the case, and has not replied to several emails I have written to him about it. When he became Leader in May 2012 he told your newspaper that under him the Council would be ‘more open and transparent’.

I hope that Cllr. Butt will honour that promise, and give Brent’s staff and residents his answers to the following questions:-

     1.  How can staff have confidence in the Council’s latest round of job cuts, when it is being presided over by two senior officers responsible for victimisation, racial discrimination and failing to follow the Council’s HR procedures?

2.    Why is Cllr. Butt still “protecting” these two senior officers, when he has known about their misconduct in the Rosemarie Clarke case since at least September 2014?

Yours faithfully,

Philip Grant.

Pavey Review won't lance Brent's boil but points to future improvements

 

The Pavey Review which was published last week has this key sentence:

0. It is important to note that the review was not a review of our HR department. It is about the role each person has to play in making Brent Council the best possible place to work. There are clear recommendations in relation to employment policies and practice, and these require the action of the entire organisation and crucially managers at all levels.
   

This limitation is why Brent Green Party and others called for an independent investigation into Brent Council, not only in the racial discrimination, victimisation and constructive dismissal that an Employment Tribunal found against first respondent Brent Council and second respondent Cara Davani, but into the previous working connections of senior staff. The latest example of the latter is the appointment of Lorraine Langham as Brent's Chief Operating Officer who like Christine Gilbert and Cara Davani previously worked for both Ofsted and Tower Hamlets Council. LINK

In any other organisation disciplinary action would have been taken against a manager found guilty of such conduct. Muhammed Butt, when challenged by members of staff on the issue at Brent Connects said the council had to follow 'due process' and make an Appeal.

Some Councillors suggested to me that disciplinary action could only take place when the Appeal process had been exhausted. A Judge found that the Council had no grounds for an Appeal but still no action was taken. Two legitimate opportunities to lance the boil missed.

Some have claimed that disciplinary action in itself would amount to victimisation or even a 'witch hunt',  or would be to succomb to political pressure. This is  a red herring. The Council owes a duty of care towards its employees and this includes ensuring that they are treated fairly in their day to day employment regardless of race, gender etc. Brent Council should have confidence that their own disciplinary procedures are robust enough to withstand such pressures.

Now the Council is in the position of having someone in charge of HR who has been found guilty of the above offences but is nevertheless in charge of recruitment and redundancies policies. Long term mprovements in processes and procedures does not address immediate issue.

Michael Pavey has done a thorough job within his limited remit, consulting widely with staff and apparently winning their confidence. One glaring ommission is consulting with the staff who have left the Council and examining any gagging clauses that were imposed. They, after all, are possible victims of poor employment and practice.

However, given the comments I have received on this blog regarding working conditions at Brent Council (many unpublished so as not to reveal identity or due to gagging clauses) as well as emails and telephone calls, soemtimes distraught,  the following comment seems emollient:

This review finds that Brent is generally a happy and inclusive place to work. But there is plenty we can do better.

Although Cllr Pavey recognises that Black and Minority Ethnic (BAME) statistics in Brent are better than some other London local authorities, he says they are far from satisfactory.  What is missing from his report is the connection between those statistics and the operation of the HR department (Proportion of BAME employees in Brent is 62%, Female employees 65%):

Both show higher proportions in the lower grade and I assume that BAME and Female would be higher still at tScale 3 to P2, and lower at the Hay grade.

Im terms of HR practice the reasons for leaving are also important and for both BAME and Females dismissals are higher (second column)

These are perhaps some of the most important recommendations:

-->

Finding: Generally, feedback from staff themselves suggests that practice is good; however, improvements can and should be made to employee management practice to achieve a more collaborative and inclusive culture. 


Engagement with staff suggests inconsistent application of policies and procedures, including as regards flexible working. There has clearly been great progress in implementing good management practice, but the Council should also seek to ensure that internal communication explain expected practice, underpinned by a clear explication of staff and manager competencies and behaviours.

·      At present, there are few reported incidents of bullying and harassment. The Council has an emphasis on informal resolution: according to the LGA this represents good practice. Consideration should be given to ensuring consistency, support and follow up within the informal resolution framework. 


·      The Council lacks a systematic Council-wide approach to learning from HR and legal processes when complaints are raised; whilst this is not uncommon, we have an opportunity to make improvements. In addition, this may give rise to inconsistent management responses. Thus, though HR takes the lead, individual managers are responsible for learning from ETs and grievances, and reviews take place with HR and within departments. Improvements should be made in terms of cross-organisational learning, peer review and Council-wide improvements. 


·      The Code of Conduct does not at present adequately articulate the behaviours and practice expected of managers and staff. Such behaviours should be clearly articulated, communicated and reflected in: 


·      recruitment and selection processes


·      ongoing team and line management

·      
appraisal processes

·      learning development processes and interventions.

Addressing this presents an opportunity to emphasise the significant priority the Council attaches to valuing diversity.

·      Evaluation of practice and understanding of staff experience should be regular and Council-wide. 


·      Internal communications should be strengthened to become a two-way flow of information. It is critical for senior management to be able to communicate values and good practice to the wider workforce. But it is equally important that communications enables the wider workforce to articulate their experiences to senior management. In two staff focus groups, more than half had not seen a copy of their service or team plan and participants suggested that improvements could be made to internal communications, including the ability for greater staff engagement and management visibility, for example through senior managers attending team meetings. This is increasingly important given the scale and pace of change. Managers themselves need to be supported to communicate effectively, but must also play the key role in staff engagement. Given the current and future constraints on funding, it is important that central advice and strategy is complemented by good practice within departments. 


The Full Report can be found  HERE