P: It’s never easy, is it? Particularly when there have been mixed messages. But the financial situation out there is not doing leisure any favours, and so you have to get these things right, and [local authority] clearly hadn’t. Certain positions were just so out of kilter with the market… And as for the future, let’s face it, pay award-wise in local government we’re looking at 0% this year. It was 1% last year and we’re looking at 0%
in over the coming two years. So I think staff, all of our staff’s salary packages are going to be eroded over a period of time.
(Sports-Two, Male, T1, P17)
TUPE Protection
Clearly the increased fiscal pressures from the local authority, and the ‘beliefs’ of the Leisure Trust managers that pay scales in the public sector were too high, seemed to push the Leisure Trusts to make the pay cuts. However, these pay cuts were only given in instances across the case studies where
35 For Sports-Two this was seen as particularly necessary by the senior management as the job evaluations resulted in very high wages compared to the labour market averages.
120 TUPE protection had not applied. For the casual workers this was perhaps because of ambiguity in the legislation regarding protection for workers on zero-hour contracts. And, in the case of the temporary worker at Sports-Two, as noted above, it was because the local authority oriented the contract to end on the day before the outsourcing transfer (in case the Leisure Trust desired to make them redundant – something the Leisure Trust eventually decided not to do, provided the individual accepted a pay cut). Thus, while TUPE was in the main offering some level of protection to formal pay conditions in outsourcing transfers for those on permanent contracts, it was apparent there remained ambiguity and loopholes in how they applied to those on temporary or casual contracts.
Pay Harmonisations
A last point to flag up about pay relates to the intention of the Leisure Trust managers to implement pay harmonisations to all staff on former local authority employment contracts. Although barely any employee participants were aware of this at the time of collecting the data, the senior managers of each of the Leisure Trusts mentioned that pay harmonisations were a likely possibility, if not already tentatively scheduled, for most staff at the leisure facilities during the second year of the contract.
While the timeframes of the data collection meant no further information was collected about whether these pay harmonisations actually transpired, it was reported at the time of the second wave of data collection that they seemed likely. According to the managers, the reason for the pay harmonisations was again predicated on limited funding given from the local authorities, as well as operating in a market with competitive and external challenges.
Table 7: Pay
Sports-One Sports-Two Sports-Three
Formal Pay Conditions Reductions of around 10% Reductions of 10-25% -
Groups Affected Casual workers Casual & temporary leisure workers
Timing Early post-transfer Early post-transfer
Supplementary Pay Conditions Various losses Various losses Various losses
Groups Affected Class Teachers Class Teachers/Personal Trainers Class Teachers
Timing Early post-transfer Early post-transfer Post-transfer
121
6.2.2 BENEFITS
With regards to benefits, there were not huge changes reported by the participants. No changes were reported during the pre-transfer periods with regards to benefits: rather the changes that occurred transpired after the outsourcing transfers. Those changes that did take place related to holiday entitlement and complimentary gym membership usage.
Changes to holiday entitlement only occurred at Sports-Two and only related to the casual and temporary workers who were ‘forced’ to transfer to a Leisure Trust employment contract. They transpired at the same time as the pay reductions (in the first months of the outsourcing transfer) and represented a slight reduction in how many days annual leave they were entitled to – reportedly an equivalent of two days less per annum for full-time staff.
With respect to changes in complimentary gym membership usage, these occurred in all the case studies and represented largely positive developments for staff. Thus, all employees were given extended usage of the sport and leisure facilities, which meant they were able to obtain full use of the fitness suite and swimming and sporting facilities for free. Almost all participants in this study who made reference to this deemed it a welcomed development and considered it a significant perk to the job. At Sports-Three this was especially the case as they were each given three complimentary memberships for immediate family members.
The developments in complimentary memberships allowed the Leisure Trusts to provide a low-cost but high-satisfaction benefit for staff, and try to build a perception that they were ‘seeking to offer’
enhanced benefits compared to the local authorities. Although the Leisure Trusts had implemented pay cuts to some staff, the managers were generally very keen to build good relations with staff, and as companies independent of the local authorities they were able to offer such benefits without encountering the challenges of ‘red tape’. However, an interesting point to make on the back of this is that the complementary membership benefits generally came with the expectation that staff would offer high performance in their work as a result.
122 Table 8: Benefits
Sports-One Sports-Two Sports-Three
Holiday Entitlement - Slightly reduced -
Groups Affected Casual & temporary leisure workers
Timing Early post-transfer
Gym Membership Complimentary Complimentary Complimentary (family)
Groups Affected All All All
Timing Three-Six months post-transfer Early post-transfer Early post-transfer
6.2.3 WORK ENVIRONMENT
In Chapter Five, it was mentioned that all of the three outsourcing takeovers resulted in some form of refurbishment for the leisure centres involved. In terms of refurbishments, Sports-One received a full interior refurbishment of the health and fitness suite, the crèche and the introduction of a new brassiere and café bar in the first six months of the takeover. Sports-Two received a refurbishment of the health and fitness suite from the local authority (in the pre-transfer period), and after the outsourcing transfer received the renovation of a new staff room and the introduction of a new air-conditioning system by the Leisure Trust. Sports-Three received developments in its reception areas and studio facilitates.
These changes were seen by participants as being enacted to enhance the facilitates for members or users of the leisure centres. However, it was also apparent that participants considered themselves to receive ‘indirect’ benefit from the changes in terms of their work environment. These indirect benefits manifested themselves in several ways. In one way, participants were pleased with the more
‘comfortable’ work spaces and ‘modern’ fitness or IT equipment. In another way, participants were able to garner a sense of pride and esteem from the professional image that their workplaces now provided. As one participant noted,
P: ... it’s like a private health club now, it’s pretty awesome for us to be honest… I feel like it’s better place, about working and that, it’s a good place to be.
(Sports-One, Male, T2, P4).
123 These changes, thus, seemed to provide indirect ways in which the employment exchange was positively impacted for participants. However, in noting this, an important caveat to highlight is that they often came with temporary disturbances as the renovations were carried out. At Sports-One, in particular, the renovations were seen by many participants as particularly problematic to their working lives during the few months they transpired, as they often resulted in office location moves and health and safety breaches. At the extreme, for example, several of the crèche supervisors at Sports-One spent nearly half a year working in a mobile home outside of the leisure centre while the crèche rooms were renovated. Several of the administrative employees also noted that the builders created huge noise disturbances and additionally left rooms filled with dust at times. Thus, although the participants felt the work environment outcomes were beneficial in the end, they were often accompanied by some temporal disruptions.
Table 9: Work Environment
Sports-One Sports-Two Sports-Three
Centre Refurbishment (s) Full Refurbishment New Fitness Suite & Staff Room New reception areas
Groups Affected All staff Leisure workers Receptionists
Timing Post-transfer Late pre-transfer/Early post-transfer Post-transfer
Refurbishment Disturbance Relocation/H&S breaches No staff room (for short period) N/A
Groups Affected Crèche workers/administration All staff
Timing Post-transfer Early post-transfer
6.2.4 JOB SECURITY
Job security was a factor that participants across all the case studies felt had been negatively affected by the outsourcing process. Across the case studies, the general trend was that the sense of job security reduced substantially during the pre-transfer period, but recovered to some extent after the outsourcing transfer took place.
In terms of the pre-transfer stage, job security was reported by participants in each of the case studies to have been badly damaged. In Sports-One and Sports-Three, the announcements about the prospect
124 of outsourcing seemed to be a timeframe when job security was particularly reduced, as participants felt unsure about what the future would hold. Some said they felt confused when their managers said
‘we’re seeking expressions of interest’, and did not understand what might happen to the organisation if the outsourcing moves went ahead – especially at Sports-Three, where information about the outsourcing process was kept very secretive. However, most common across the cases was the perception that outsourcing might lead to redundancies or pay cuts, and this was something that brought feelings of anxiety and a lack of control:
I: How have you felt about job security over the last twelve months or so? And how do