14. Memorandum submitted by the Public
and Commercial Services Union, Department for Work and Pensions
Group
I am writing to you on behalf of the Public
and Commercial Services Union, (PCS), Department For Work and
Pensions Group. On behalf of the Union I attended a Conference
organised by the Centre for Corporate Accountability and the TUS
on Monday, 13 June, 2005, which discussed the Draft Bill in detail.
My union is the largest one, representing 90,000
Civil Servants, in the Department For Work and Pensions, (DWP),
and our members are particularly interested in the restriction
on Crown Immunity for Corporate Responsibility in the terms of
the draft Bill. Whereas we are pleased that some Government Departments
will be considered as have a duty of care for staff under statute,
and that the DWP is one of the Departments listed on the schedule
as per Paragraph 2 (b), we are concerned about the opt-out clause
of Paragraph 3, in that The Secretary of State may amend the Schedule
by order. We are also concerned about Paragraph 4 (2), Relevant
Duty Of Care. This reads "an organisation that is a public
authority does not owe a duty of care for the purposes of this
Act in respect of a decision as to matters of public policy, (including
in particular the allocation of public resources or the weighing
of competing public interests)". If this is read in conjunction
with Paragraph 1 of the Draft Bill in that an organisation to
which this section applies is guilty of the offence of corporate
manslaughter if the way in which any of the organisation's activities
are managed or organised by its senior managers, and in conjunction
with Paragraph 2 defining a senior manager, then, within the DWP,
the elimination of crown immunity becomes somewhat meaningless.
As detailed in Government Reports, Civil Servants
in the DWP, and in particular, within the business unit of Jobcentre
Plus, do face violence and threats of violence from members of
the public because of the nature of adverse decisions under the
Social Security Acts. In the past, Civil Servants have been killed
in the line of duty in the predecessor department to the DWP.
Even now, my members are still facing attacks and suffering injuries
because of their job. In most cases this is as a direct result
of decisions made by senior management pursuing what is termed
public policy. The reduction of staffing levels in the DWP, the
remote processing of benefit, the provision of inadequate IT systems
to deliver benefit, the deliverance of adverse decisions to the
public in an open planned environment in Jobcentres, has increased
the amount of hostility to staff caused by frustration felt by
members of the public. If a member of staff is killed, because
of inadequate safety control provision, despite the inadequacy
being brought to the attention of management by accredited health
and safety representatives, then the Draft Bill appears to grant
crown immunity to the DWP management from prosecution of the offence
of corporate manslaughter because the decisions were made at senior
management level in pursuance of public policy. In essence, under
this Draft, Crown Immunity is eliminated and then restored.
The PCS in the DWP would, therefore, wish to
see a much clearer definition as to what constitutes public policy
decisions and as to what decisions would come under the terms
of the Bill, in which consideration of prosecution for corporate
manslaughter, as applied to Crown Bodies, would take place.
16 June 2005
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