A two-day PCS National Executive Committee has just concluded in London. Two key matters demonstrate why change is imperative in the national Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union elections that began on 16 April and why it is extremely important that members vote for Marion Lloyd and the coalition for change in PCS. NEC Elections 2025
Six hours of the meeting time were wasted on one paper – far from the most important paper at the April NEC – thanks to the continuing poor judgment of the General Secretary, Fran Heathcote, and President, Martin Cavanagh.
Following this, on the union’s national campaign for jobs, pay and against the austerity agenda which Labour now seems to be rolling out, the General Secretary moved a wildly complacent paper which proposed no meaningful actions and indeed noted that the attack on Arm’s Length Bodies (ALBs) across government was an “opportunity” but did not outline a national strategy to resist, deferring this until late May.
When Marion Lloyd proposed recommendations to add actions to the paper, to pro-actively build the confidence of members and reps to fight back, these proposals were once again vetoed by Cavanagh. Actions agreed in January – which Cavanagh has trumpeted as being “unanimous” – have still not been carried out.
“Democracy Alliance” try to bribe PCS members
All of this must be read in the context of the bribe promised to members who vote for them, of repaying to them the strike levy collected between late 2024 and early 2025. This strike fund is the money that would be used to fund any serious action to defeat the government’s cuts and to win us a pay rise.
The amount – £35 per member – is about 0.1% of an EO wage in DWP. The several million amassed could be used to win much more than an additional 0.1% pay raise for members.
Cavanagh and his “Democracy Alliance” do not have a plan to defeat the cuts or to win a pay rise. Having collapsed the union’s national campaign in 2023 and vetoed every attempt to build one in 2024, they can’t win any argument about stopping the cuts or fighting on pay, so this attempted bribe seeks to distract members from their lack of response to potentially 80,000 job cuts and a below-inflation 2025 pay rise.
Hours wasted on “Attitudes and Speakers at Conference” paper
Every year, the union’s NEC receives a copy of Standing Orders Committee Paper 1 (SOC1). This outlines all motions sent to Annual Delegate Conference from branches, and from the NEC itself. Every year, the NEC agrees a position and an NEC speaker on each motion. This year, that took a 6-hour debate thanks to Cavanagh and co.
Heathcote and Cavanagh put a paper to the NEC which outlined a whole range of positions which they knew beyond doubt would not be agreed by the NEC. They then forced the NEC to go through all 114 A-marked motions (i.e. those that will be debate at Conference) and forced a vote on every proposed change to the NEC paper.
When challenged, Cavanagh pushed back that it was open to the NEC majority to have submitted a paper in advance with their own views. The last time this happened, which was in relation to the allocation of Conference motions to NEC subcommittees to carry out, he vetoed the proposal, arguing that it contradicted the recommendation of the General Secretary.
There is no member or rep in PCS who would not agree that the way NEC business is conducted is ridiculous. This is entirely down to the inconsistent, partisan, undemocratic behaviour of Cavanagh as national president. Elections have begun. There is nothing else to be done beyond voting for Marion Lloyd and voting out of office Martin Cavanagh, who has been an absolute barrier to re-building PCS.
Defeat complacency and inertia at the top of PCS: vote Lloyd for President
A key discussion at the April NEC was the so-called “national campaign” on pay, pensions, jobs and workloads, office closures and many other issues including hybrid working, all of which dramatically impact our members. The NEC last discussed the national campaign on 14 February; in terms of actual campaigning, very little has happened, while the government have been busy laying plans.
For this reason, the NEC majority were surprised to have simple proposals – the only proposals on the table – vetoed by the President. Cavanagh spuriously argued that they contravened the Standing Orders because they proposed extending the length of the May NEC meeting. Agree or disagree, this only impacted one proposal – the Cavanagh did not mention the other clauses in ruling the motion out. It was left to Heathcote to argue that “we’re too close to conference”.
Too close to Conference to prepare to defend jobs! That’s a new low even for them.
The paper put forward by Heathcote referred to the situation with Arms’ Length Bodies as an “opportunity”, starting from the position that she does not necessarily support the existence of certain ALBs (sometimes called Quangos – quasi non-governmental organisations). This is the wrong position to start from: we must oppose cuts. Full stop.
Heathcote also seemed to draw a distinction between cuts and “arbitrary cuts”, which retreats from the general principle of opposition to cuts. “Arbitrary cuts” is the government’s language – they say they’re not undertaking “arbitrary cuts”, the opposite being “justified cuts”. All cuts result in impact to our members. They impact jobs and, even if exits are voluntary, they impact workloads and working practices.
We oppose all cuts. Increasingly, an NEC meeting with the General Secretary feels like listening to the voice of the Cabinet Office speaking through her to the NEC.
Government cuts incoming
Between 14 Feb and 16/17 April, national announcements have signalled a full-frontal attack on civil service staffing, with expectation of 15% cuts to “administrative” (i.e. staffing) budgets by 2030. This follows on from announcements in July 2024 about 2% cuts and announcements in October about 5% cuts.
What this will mean in practice is not known – but the Cabinet Office have already seen an announcement that 1,200 jobs are to go via exit. A further 900 jobs are due to be moved out of the Cabinet Office, and what that means is also unknown – none of this was discussed with the National Trade Union Committee before launch.
Other areas have already seen cuts to jobs via attrition (e.g. 5% job cuts in the Department for Education) and via hundreds of voluntary exits (e.g. at the Department for Transport). NHS England central staff have been told half of their jobs will go. Thousands of more job cuts already seem to be planned at the Ministry of Defence…and all of this is before HM Treasury responds to Departmental and agency submissions to the Spending Review that is currently under way.
Officials at the Cabinet Office leaked to the press that the Cabinet Office is “leading by example” in cutting a third of jobs in the department. Ellie Clarke, NEC member and union rep at the Cabinet Office characterised the mood as one of fear, especially for those with disabilities, or home working. The General Secretary’s response was dismissive, saying 700 staff had agreed to a voluntary exit, and she offered no other support or reassurance to Cabinet Office members whose jobs are under threat.
Another key part of the announcements has been a review of “Places for Growth”, which promises to move civil service jobs outside of London. There is major potential for this to hit jobs in London – both through actual job losses and through the constraining of opportunity for promotion or recruitment, while workloads rocket.
Also announced are a new idea, “mutually agreed exits”. What this actually means is also unclear, but in the private sector this means exits without paying people the redundancy pay which, in the civil service, they would be entitled to. All union members should be alarmed by the news coming out from the top of government.
Get the campaign started now!
The NEC majority proposed some simple steps to get things going now – and some of these proposals had been agreed in January but still had not been implemented:
- That in addition to the actions taken by FTOs as per MAB 06-25, that a branch briefing be issued to all groups and branches giving a full report of the discussions with the Cabinet Office and urging all branches to call members’ meetings in the period before Conference to explain the need for a campaign across PCS, to win our demands. Conference is the next step, to debate and agree a strategy. The bulletin should outline the key issues facing members that are under discussion with the Cabinet Office, including but not limited to:
- The attack on jobs, especially announcements on NHS England, Cabinet Office etc) and the attack on ALBs etc.
- Pay
- Pensions
- Office closures, job relocation and compulsory moves (incl. PfG).
- Hybrid and flexible working
- Privatisation
- National bargaining
- To support the members’ meetings, that leaflets now be produced, as per the decision by the NEC in January 2025, updated to reflect the key attacks from the Labour government, our key demands, and the text of which should be agreed by the Senior Officers’ Committee. Alternative language to cover privatised and devolved areas should be circulated for input from relevant bodies: SEC, WEC, Comm Sector etc. Printing to be ready by end of April to support May members’ meetings.
- That the bargaining team with the Cabinet Office now be extended to add three lay reps, as per the NEC decision in January, with nominations to be accepted from the floor of this NEC.
- That the duration of the NEC in May be extended to allow for a full discussion of the Labour government-proposed cuts and how we build a campaign to defeat these attacks. A draft motion to ADC should be presented by the General Secretary for discussion at that meeting, and if not dealt with by the Senior Officers beforehand, a draft national pay claim should be tabled for the May NEC also. This should be able to take account of the revised Places for Growth (PfG) strategy, which is likely to be published in late April and which may have a serious impact on London-based PCS members.
In the background to all of this, the Labour government is steadily retreating from many commitments as part of the original draft of the Employment Rights Bill, most recently their pledge to repeal the 50% strike ballot threshold requirement imposed by the Anti-Trade Union Act 2016.
We need to keep reps and members fully informed. This NEC must continue to provide leadership right up until the day it leaves office, when it comes to fighting for the basic interests of members – for a proper pay rise, against job cuts and compulsory relocation of work and so on. The attack on ALBs will certainly involve centralisation of function and job cuts; concrete steps to oppose should be prepared now.
This NEC was an NEC like many others this year, thanks to how they have been run by the chair, Martin Cavanagh. The General Secretary wastes time by literally reading out her papers. Then straightforward, obvious things – even previously agreed matters – are either vetoed or not carried out. Cavanagh and Heathcote are an absolute catastrophe in progress, for our members. There is no room for their complacency.
They must go.
We urge all reps to get involved with the Broad Left Network. We urge all activists and members in all parts of the union to vote for Marion Lloyd and the coalition for change, of PCS Broad Left Network, of PCS Independent Left and independent socialists in HMRC. It is absolutely time for a change.
PCS Broad Left Network 