Yesterday, I spent some time with Phil Pluck, Northern Director of ACAS. Really informative and enlightening meeting. I have always been an advocate of ACAS as a useful source of advice for employees and on occasion for myself! I have also used them for training Employee Representatives in a TUPE situation - very good training, good price and additional benefit of employees having a trusted, independent source for answers.

Some of the interesting points discussed with Phil:

The Recession - % increase in cases for ACAS is 40% (not dissimilar to the last recessions figures), they were hoping that this would start to decrease somewhat but has remained steady due to different sectors being effected at difference times. Interestingly the corelation between the onset of redundancy processes and the increase in mental health issues - Phil had had some interesting conversations with the GMC

The Grimsby TOTAL “strike” non-union politically-motivated pickets posing as union members, the fact that TOTAL’s orignal contractor prior to the Italians was British but failed to fulfill the terms of the contract (interesting that wasn’t widely reported!). Also the diffculties faced when ACAS were brought in by the Government.

I didn’t realise that ACAS were called on for international work, we chatted around work completed in China for the Government, in understanding what employee relations actually is and how it contributes to organisational development.

Phil was a feast of information on the changes in mediation requirements, the types of training that ACAS conduct for employees and employers. Phil was great to chat to, clearly knowledgable and able. Although his first Public Sector appointment, Phil is dedicated to improving ACAS, its commerciality and its services, expanding more into serving the private sector. ACAS mainly work with the public sector but in my experience can add incredible value to SME’s and Corporations as a trusted name for employees in negotiations/mediations, expertise (in my experience - I admit that not everyone’s experiences will be the same) and value for money.