The Communities and Third Sector (CTS) team work in partnership with Camden’s voluntary sector – that is the borough’s charities and community groups. Some of these such as Age UK Camden are relatively large; others may have only one or two paid staff. The team runs funding programmes, helps organisations to develop, supports volunteering and also works with faith groups.
Our restructure has been a confusing process with several changes of timetable and plan. The Team is now 15 posts (some part time) while the new team will be 9.5 posts.
Our current team has six managers! The new team will have just one manager and 8.5 (full-time equivalent) officers. All the managers are leaving – mixture of early retirement, voluntary redundancy and the Head of Service, previously seconded, returns to her home team.
Interviews began at the end of November, with officers’ interviews in the week commencing 5 December. Only six current officers are going for the new roles. So IF all are successful at interview that still means that out of the original 15-person team only be six staff will remain. This will result in a serious loss of “organisational memory”, especially as our Director and Executive Director are both relatively new to their posts.
While the overall numbers in the new team are higher than first feared the new team will still be expected to do more than the current one.
Members in CTS are very grateful to UNISON for practical and moral support. It was very helpful for us to meet as a group with Branch Secretary George Binette. He answered our questions, and largely as a result of UNISON input to the consultation, the gradings of the manager’s post has been re-considered and there’s an additional officer’s post in the final structure.