It is not often a government target relating to learning is actually met; rarer still when it is met a whole year early. But this is exactly what has happened this year with Unionlearn - the often over-looked learning support division of the Trades Union Congress (TUC).
Unionlearn helps other unions provide or broker access to learning for employees. In 1997 it set itself an ambitious aim of training up 22,000 union learning reps (ULRs), by 2010. By the start of this year, this had already been achieved and there are now 23,000. It is estimated ULRs will have helped more than 225,000 employees in 700 organisations take on learning opportunities during 2008/9 - ranging from the 25,000 on Skills for Life courses (NVQ Level 2/3) to 20,784 staff undertaking continual professional development.
But an exclusive interview with Tom Wilson, who took over as Unionlearn's new director at the end of July, reveals much more needs to be done, and HR directors need to play their part: "Many organisations are missing a trick. They are still very traditional and wary of unions," he says. "Although we've made great strides we still have a long way to go. We want to spread the message ULRs can change the culture of conflict and improve learning opportunities."
Government figures show one-third of employers still do not train staff at all - equivalent to more than eight million people. But, according to a TUC survey of ULRs and their managers, 61% of line managers said ULRs help address skills gaps, while 79% agreed they had raised awareness of learning in their organisation. In many companies it is ULRs who conduct learning needs assessments; in doing so they take a considerable amount of work off HR professionals. Wilson thinks they need to be better appreciated. "It's true ULRs take work off HR, but they also make work for them too by creating a demand for learning. Training managers have been known to resist ULRs as interlopers taking over their jobs."
Wilson says his aim is for every unionised workplace to have a ULR. "Historically the role of unions was to educate, agitate and organise. Given that each ULR enthuses an average of 50 learners, I feel the work they do shows unions are getting back to their roots."
According to Wilson, the role of learning reps will assume greater importance next year, when all employees with a minimum of six months' service will have a legal right to request time off from their day-to-day duties for training - paid for by their employer.
"We've just launched a course for ULRs on how to equip staff to make reasonable requests to managers for training," Wilson explains. "We won't be bashing our drums, demanding staff make the most of their legal right; it will be more working with employers and staff to make sure everyone is aware of their rights. Sometimes ULRs will know more about training than line managers, but that's fine. It's not about scoring points against each other, but about working in partnership."
UNIONLEARN IN NUMBERS
- Number of ULRs: 23,000
- Male/female split: 44/56
- Number of union learning centres: 400
- Activism: 35% of ULRs are new to union activism
- Skills Pledges signed in 2008 through ULRs: 228
A TALE OF TWO LEARNING REPS
- Tom O'Callaghan, Metroline
Tom O'Callaghan is a project manager at 1,200-fleet strong London bus company Metroline. But he also acts as one of the company's 20 ULRs who work across its 10 depots. "I've always been a union member, but it was in 1998, when I went on a course of my own, that I got hooked on learning," he says. "At the time Metroline was starting to see lots of foreign engineers arriving, but not many of them had good English skills. That's when I decided the learning agenda was so important."
His triumph has been the Learning Bus - a specially converted bus fitted with 12 computers and 10 laptops, that enables the company's 3,900 workers to take courses ranging from languages to IT and web design. The bus was initially bought for just £1 and O'Callaghan obtained funding from the College of North East London to pay for tutors. So far more than 2,000 staff have a learning qualification they would not ordinarily have been able to pursue. "I sit on a steering group reporting direct to the CEO. The contribution the bus has made was instrumental in the business deciding to continue funding when our original grant ran out three years ago."
- Roger Irvine, Merseytravel
With three separate business divisions and 10 different unions all vying to have their say, it was almost inevitable that ferry and tunnel company Merseytravel would have no co-ordinated learning strategy. That was until Roger Irvine, lead ULR and union secretary, got involved six years ago. "A new training manager arrived, and she and I quickly realised a co-ordinated approach to learning was needed," he says. "Together we produced the company's first formal learning partnership and a joint learning forum which produced real learning agreements. A £203,000 grant bought us Skills for Life training and IT tutors with enough money over to establish three online learning centres." Irvine says the success of the work - which has now garnered two further rounds of funding - is down to the organisation's ability to face tough questions. "We did a corporate learning survey that asked staff what they thought of the training they'd had up to that point, and there was no trying to hide behind the figures." Success includes persuading the board to give £1,000 interest-free loans to staff wanting to buy computers, and offering IT courses for computer-using workers. For non-PC users who want to do the course for their own benefit, the company allows them to do it in their free time. On completion of the course, staff are given back the time it took them to study for it - five days off. "We're not perfect, but things work because training, HR and unions are all on the same table," says Irvine. Since he first became a ULR six years ago, 90% of the 920 staff have now done a Level 2 course.
