redundancy - consultation meeting

[maccie]

Our company has informed us by letter that we are at risk of redundancy. (30 day notice)

A consultation meeting was sceduled for the 11th of this month. However when I worked my shift on the evening of the 10th, other staff members were talking about the meeting that had happened that afternoon.

None of the people working the evening shifts had been notified of the changing date of the meeting.

When I received the letter with the notes from the meeeting a week later, one of the suggestions made had been to dispense with the evening shifts and for the work done by us could be undertaken on the day shift. No other other department had been specifically named as dispensible, just genral cost cutting measures, holiday reductions, 4 day week ect.

I feel that this suggestion would not have been made if any of us had been represented. This would be the only consultation meeting and they are now in the selection process. The genral feeling in the company is that our small department is set to be made redundant and I dont feel we have been fairly represented.

Is there anything I can do about this now or in the future.

[KatieMiddleton]

Yes you can raise a grievance about the way the consultation meeting was conducted. You can do this on your own or your whole department can raise a group grievance so long as you all sign it.

Your organisation should have a grievance policy you can follow but if you can't find it you can outline your complaint in a letter to your line manager and include a request for the grievance procedure within that letter. ACAS have a good guide to disciplinary and grievance procedures here

Do you have union representation? If so you should contact them immediately.

You don't have to go in all guns blazing - you could instead formally but politely ask (ie in writing) that a consultation meeting be held with your department as per the legal requirments and to "avoid any confusion during this difficult time" or similar. That would be my preferred option if having a quiet word with my line manager didn't get it sorted.

[Grevling]

Who was the employee representative? Did you speak to them prior to the meeting? Are your employers planning on meeting you individually?

Hate to break it to you but consultation is a con. They are likely to have already made the decision about closing the night shift, companies don't put people on consultation willy nilly they usually do it with intent. All the consultations I've been on we'd already made the decision just not written it down anywhere we were always considering it. While raising a grievance is a good idea don't expect it to change the outcome.