Research uncovers continued union decline and increasing availability of flexible working

• Managers showed an increased understanding of employees' responsibilities outside work. Around two-thirds (65 per cent) of managers believed that it was up to individual employees to balance their work and family responsibilities. This represented a significant decline since 1998, when 84 per cent of managers took this view. However, there was little change in employees' views on the extent to which managers were understanding (55 per cent found managers understanding in 1998, compared to 58 per cent in 2004).
  
  
• The 1998-2004 WERS Panel Survey (conducted in continuing workplaces) recorded a substantial increase in the availability of a range of flexible working and leave arrangements, including : homeworking (28 per cent of workplaces, up from 16 per cent in 1998); term-time only working (28 per cent, up from 14 per cent in 1998); flexi-time (26 per cent, up from 19 per cent in 1998); job-sharing (41 per cent, up from 31 per cent in 1998); switching from full-time to part-time hours (64 per cent, up from 46 per cent in 1998); parental leave (73 per cent, up from 38 per cent in 1998): paid paternity leave (92 per cent, up from 48 per cent in 1998); and special paid leave in emergencies (31 per cent, up from 24 per cent in 1998).
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  Eleven per cent of employees usually worked more than 48 hours a week. Whilst men were more likely to work longer hours than women, they were less likely to work long hours in workplaces where women were in the majority than in workplaces where they were not.

• One-half of employees were employed in workplaces with a recognised trade union; just over one-third (34 per cent) were union members; and 40 per cent had their pay set through collective bargaining.
  
  
• There was a continued decline of collective labour organisation. Employees were less likely to be union members than they were in 1998; workplaces were less likely to recognise unions for bargaining over pay and conditions; and collective bargaining was less prevalent.
  
  
• However, most of the decline in the rate of union recognition occurred amongst small workplaces: only 18 per cent of workplaces with 10-24 employees recognised unions in 2004, compared with 28 per cent six years earlier. Among workplaces with 25 or more employees, the incidence of recognition remained stable at around two-fifths (39 per cent in 2004, compared with 41 per cent in 1998). The continual decline in the rate of recognition seen among this group over the 1980s and 1990s therefore appears to have been arrested.
  
  
• There has also been a decline in the incidence of joint consultative committees. They were present in 14 per cent of workplaces with 10 or more employees in 2004. A further 25 per cent of workplaces did not have a workplace-level committee, but had a consultative forum that operated at a higher level in the organisation. The equivalent figures in 1998 were 20 per cent and 27 per cent respectively. Overall, two-fifths (42 per cent) of all employees worked in a workplace with a workplace-level joint consultative committee, compared with 46 per cent in 1998.
  
  
• The proportion of workplaces with recognised unions in which members had access to a lay union representative, either on-site or elsewhere within the organisation, was no different in 2004 than in 1998 (68 per cent). However, in 2004 fewer workplaces with recognised unions had on-site representatives (45 per cent in 2004, compared with 55 per cent in 1998).
  
  
• Union Learning Representatives have an officially-recognised role in providing training and learning opportunities to fellow union members at their workplace. The findings indicate that six per cent of all on-site lay representatives were designated Union Learning Representatives at the time of the survey.
  
  
• Mutual trust between managers and employee representatives appeared to exist in only a minority of management/union representative relationships (31 per cent), but was more prevalent between managers and non-union representatives (64 per cent).
• Whilst there has been a decline in representative forms of employee voice, there has been some growth in direct forms of communication between management and employees, including wider use of face-to-face meetings with the entire workforce or teams of employees (91 per cent, up from 85 per cent in 1998), and greater use of systematic communication through the management chain (64 per cent, up from 52 per cent in 1998).

• Overt workplace conflict has remained low since 1998. Managers in only 5 per cent of workplaces in 2004 reported some collective dispute of any kind in the year prior to the survey (six per cent in 1998). Eight per cent of workplaces reported that an employment tribunal claim had been brought against them in the preceding year (six per cent in 1998). Managers in 22 per cent of workplaces reported that one or more employees had formally raised a matter through the individual grievance procedure (21 per cent in 1998).
  
  
• Managers in 88 per cent of workplaces reported that they had a formal procedure for handling grievances, while 91 per cent reported a formal procedure for dealing with disciplinary issues or dismissals (excluding redundancies). There was no change in the incidence of grievance procedures since 1998, but there was an increase in the incidence of disciplinary procedures (85 per cent in 1998). Of the workplaces reporting that a formal meeting was part of their procedural arrangements, almost all allowed employees to be accompanied.
  
  
• Setting out concerns in writing, formal meetings and appeals formed essential elements of the grievance procedure in 43 per cent of workplaces in 2004. These elements were present in a higher proportion (71 per cent) of workplaces in relation to disciplinary action.
  
  
• Just one per cent of workplaces did not allow their employees to be accompanied in grievance meetings, and two per cent did not allow accompaniment at disciplinary meetings.

• There has been an increase in the proportion of workplaces with formal written equal opportunities policies since 1998. In 2004, 73 per cent of workplaces had a formal policy in place, compared with 64 per cent in 1998.
  
  
• Workplaces in 2004 were much more likely to have equal opportunities policies which covered the new and forthcoming statutory grounds than in 1998, specifically religion (82 per cent of workplace with any formal policy, up from 72 per cent in 1998), sexual orientation (70 per cent, up from 56 per cent in 1998) and age (68 per cent, up from 61 per cent in 1998).

• Since 1998, the proportion of workplaces where women were under-represented in management has changed very little (72 per cent in 2004, compared with 73 per cent in 1998). Men were under-represented in management in 27 per cent of workplaces in both 1998 and 2004.
  
  

• The proportion of workplaces with a range of management practices designed to enhance employee commitment remained fairly constant. The practices that are commonly discussed under the 'high commitment' banner relate to work organisation, recruitment and training, communication, financial incentives, job-security guarantees, harmonised fringe benefits and formal disciplinary or grievance procedures. A simple measure of the proportion of workplaces combining work organisation practices with a variety of the other practices only marginally increased since 1998. However, there were some changes in the incidence of practices:
  • performance appraisals were used in 78 per cent of workplaces in 2004 compared with 73 per cent in 1998
  • 84 per cent of workplaces provided off-the-job training for some of their experienced core employees over the previous year compared with 73 per cent in 1998
  • one-fifth (21 per cent) of workplaces had groups of non-managerial employees that met to solve specific problems or discuss aspects of performance or quality compared with 16 per cent in 1998.

• The use of arrangements which offer employers the potential for adjusting the size of the workforce was widespread. A large majority (83 per cent) of workplaces had part-time employees, up from 79 per cent in 1998. Just under one third (30 per cent) of workplaces had employees on temporary or fixed-term contracts in 2004, a similar proportion to that found in 1998 (32 per cent). The use of temporary agency staff, although less prevalent than fixed-term contracts, was still quite widespread, with 17 per cent of all workplaces employing 'temps'. The proportion was similar (18 per cent) in 1998.

• Whilst job satisfaction with influence and pay has remained unchanged since 1998, there has been an increase in the percentage of employees satisfied with the sense of achievement they get from work (from 64 per cent in 1998 to 70 per cent in 2004).
  
  
• Management's rating of the employment relations climate improved since 1998, although employees' views changed little over the period. Managers in 30 per cent of continuing workplaces reported that relations had 'improved a lot'. The same proportion reported that they had 'improved a little', and they deteriorated in only 4 per cent of continuing workplaces since 1998. Employees were more negative about relations than their employers: they had poorer perceptions of relations than management in half of all cases (51 per cent) in 2004, whereas the opposite was true in only 13 per cent of cases.