Access not permitted for this user account.

The work of the 64^th Council focused on seven areas, which are assigned to standing committees:

• Legal questions
• Staff-management relations
• Human resources management
• Conditions of service in the field
• Social security/occupational health and safety
• General Service questions
• Professional salaries and allowances

Legal Questions

The Standing Committee focused on a number of priorities, the first of which had been the determination of membership categories within the Federation. The Standing Committee agreed in principle to a system based on members’ association with four ‘pillars’. In addition, special categories were drawn up for FUNSAs and honorary members. The migration to the new system would be based on an in-depth validation of all current membership data. The exercise called for the establishment of an ad hoc working group to develop further the methodology for reviewing the membership structure.

Discussion also centred on the administration of justice in the common system and the need to post on the FICSA website documentation pertaining to past cases. The Standing Committee felt that the internal justice system had improved with the new institutions in the United Nations being swifter than in the past and the judgments increasingly in favour of the complainants. It was noted that UNESCO/STU was currently working on a comparison of ILOAT and UNAT/UNDT practices.

The Standing Committee also took up the issue of harassment and its prevention in the workplace. Two comprehensive recommendations had been drawn up by WHO/HQ Geneva Staff Association, with the support of all other WHO and UNAIDS delegations to the Council, relating to the creation of a working environment free from harassment and where grievances were promptly and fairly resolved. That issue was of particular pertinence to WHO, which was facing the introduction of a new policy as well as to all member associations/unions that were intent upon preventing harassment.

Human resources management

The Standing Committee focused on the problems of and barriers to inter-agency mobility, which had not yielded its potential benefits. Given the complexities of the issue, the Standing Committee had proposed the establishment of a sub-group within the Committee.

The Committee also put forward a proposal on performance management, its concern being the fact that staff often stagnated at the top of their respective grade. It was a subject that called for further study and would require the collection of information from member associations/unions. The Standing Committee also sought greater staff participation in exit interviews. If that could not be in the form of being physically present at the time of the interviews, staff associations/unions should have access to the data collected and the analyses thereof so that they could see ways and means of encouraging the best staff to stay.

The issue of recognizing domestic partnerships had also been the subject of discussion. Council subsequently adopted a resolution on the recognition of domestic partnerships for dependency purposes.

Two other issues that the Standing Committee had taken up were: the variety of rewards for and recognition of good service in the common system; and the practice of hiring retirees that was detrimental to the career prospects of both General Service and Professional staff still in service.

Council decided that FICSA should collect details on best practices regarding reward and recognition opportunities and upload those details to the HRM database on the FICSA website and should collect and share data related to the type and number of contracts used when hiring retirees.

Social security/Occupational health and safety

Discussion centred on the increasing use of non-staff to perform staff duties on the grounds of cost-savings. Those savings, however, were in the form of denying those hired as non-staff access to the medical and life insurance coverage that the organizations provided their staff. It was, however, pointed out that even when hiring non-staff, the organizations still incurred liabilities that they should respect. Furthermore, organizations were morally obliged to insure non-staff against death and disability.

Concerning lowering the period of eligibility for a divorced spouse benefit, the Standing Committee was not opposed to supporting the proposal to lower from 10 to 5 years the period of eligibility for a divorced spouse benefit, as proposed by FAFICS. 

Information was provided on the on-line petition for the introduction of the 120-month exchange rate average as a means of improving the income of Professional staff living outside the US dollar zone and the text would be reviewed before posting.

It was decided that Members of the Standing Committee should liaise with their administrations on encouraging disabled people to apply and establishing facilities suitable for disabled people, it being understood that hiring staff should be based on competence rather than on their degree of disability.

Staff associations/unions should contact their administrations and encourage them to request UN Cares trainers to provide staff training on HIV/AIDS.  Staff associations/unions should also urge their administrations to uphold their pledges to UN Cares (given the availability of funds).

Conditions of service in the field

Concern was expressed over the possible threats to staff safety arising out of the change in terminology - ‘danger pay’ instead of ‘hazard pay’ – and the measurement of risk. On a related matter, the representative of FUNSA Egypt reported that the locally recruited staff had not been informed of any evacuation plans for national staff and had been upset by the unequal treatment. The representative went on to report that decisions to relocate locally recruited staff hinged on the assessment of the perceived threat to United Nations staff that were undertaken daily by the security management team.

The Committee made an extensive list of recommendations, most notably on security issues and the classification of duty stations, which were approved by the Council for action by FICSA.

General Service questions

In respect of the salary survey methodologies, the Standing Committee insisted on the same procedure being followed for all duty stations under the same methodology. In connection with the methodologies, the role of the local salary survey committees should be clearly defined. Furthermore, a plea had been entered for postponing the approval of the new salary survey methodology until July 2011.

The Standing Committee stressed the importance of workshops on General Service classification and job evaluation, in addition to which it had listed a number of workshops that it considered necessary.

Professional salaries and allowances

The Chair described the unsatisfactory state of affairs prevailing with respect to the comparator and the doubts whether in fact the US civil service was indeed the best comparator. Regrettably, from the three countries whose civil services were ultimately taken into consideration for the purposes of comparison (Belgium, the United Kingdom and the United States), it was known that not only was the British civil service introducing a series of cuts but the US civil service had also frozen salaries.

Another area of contention was the place-to-place surveys; the Chair sought support for the legal action that the Vienna-based staff associations were mooting in preparation for contesting the surveys. He confirmed that the Standing Committee had also considered the issue of the payment of a lump sum for non-tuition expenses under the education grant.

Staff-management relations

The Chair confirmed the importance that the Committee had attached to finding a solution to the release of the Federation’s President and General Secretary and developing an acceptable cost-sharing arrangement. Despite having sent an earlier resolution to the Secretary-General of the United Nations after the previous session of the Council, no reply had been received and the problem remained unresolved. In a joint session with the Standing Committee on Legal Questions, a new resolution on the release of the officers of the Federation had been drawn up. It was also felt that matters would be improved were a working group to be set up draw up a strategy for future action on the issue.

The Standing Committee felt the ongoing JIU report on staff/management relations should ultimately be made available to staff.  It looked forward to a long-term partnership with the Trades Union Congress (TUC) in the United Kingdom.

Member associations/unions should share details of the confidentiality clause applied in their organizations and included in recognition agreements and/or standards of conduct.  At the international level, FICSA should seek to have a similar clause incorporated in the standards of conduct. Likewise details of whistle blowing should also be shared.