Novus staff walk out again in Covid safety dispute

This is the fourth time time Novus members have walked out in the past two months in their dispute over the failure of Novus to address health and safety concerns raised by prison educators, a failure to meaningfully engage with UCU, and repeated attempts by management to intimidate staff who raised health and safety issues.

Unlike other prison education employers, Novus refused to properly engage with UCU over requests for changes to education delivery to keep staff and learners safe, and they have continuously declined to meet UCU health and safety representatives. Instead Novus launched an investigation into them.

UCU has since received reports from members that new staff have been sent onto wings without any personal protection training; that staff have been asked to visit multiple residential units, negating attempts to create workplace bubbles; and that learners have come into class vaping.

Mediation at Acas has failed to resolve the dispute, and Novus refused to drop its investigations into UCU's health and safety reps, finally refusing to share the findings of the resulting internal report. It will not assure UCU that no action will be taken against staff fighting for a safe teaching and learning environment. Novus also refused to share the terms of reference of the investigation,  or the names of its investigators. Nor were the UCU members being investigated ever spoken to as part of the investigation.

Read the full news story here