Trade Union Facility Time

The Trade Union (Facility Time Publication Requirements) Regulations 2017 took effect on 01 April 2017. This means that public sector organisations are now required to publish certain information about trade union officials and facility time they are granted.

What is facility time?

Facility time is time off from a job role, granted by employers to their employees who are trade union representatives. It allows employees to carry out their trade union role.
This includes:

• duties carried out for the trade union, for example, accompanying an employee to disciplinary or grievance hearing
• work as a union learning representative
• attending training, and carrying out duties under the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974.

Publishing requirements

The regulations require public sector organisations to publish:

• the number of employees who were relevant union officials during the relevant period, and the number of full time equivalent employees
• the percentage of time spent on facility time for each relevant union official
• the percentage of pay bill spent on facility time
• the number of hours spent by relevant union officials on paid trade union activities as a percentage of total paid facility time hours.

This information is provided in the Trust’s Trade Union Facility Time Report 2017-18.