Restructuring and redundancy

The staff restructuring exercise may lead to the conclusion that a deputy or assistant head post is redundant to the revised structure.

This may or may not mean that the member of staff is redundant. If they are not, then the three-year protection of salary and other conditions apply. The TLR process is not a substitute for redundancy procedures if the intention is that the person concerned should leave the school before the end of the three-year period.

Any member affected should contact the SHA hotline immediately for support. SHA has long-established procedures in place for dealing with situations where both the head and the deputy or assistant head are members.

It is important that SHA is one of the associations consulted formally as part of the restructuring process, that is, an elected representative should be nominated to receive the proposed structure and to make comments on behalf of members.

This could either be a branch secretary or a SHA member elected within a school to be SHA representative. It should not, of course, be the headteacher. While heads will undoubtedly wish to involve senior colleagues in developing the new structure, this is not a substitute for formal consultation.

It is also important to remember that all responses to the consultation must be presented to governors for their consideration at the time of their second meeting. It may be that they will wish to adjust elements of the structure in the light of the outcomes of the consultation. The process will not have fulfilled the requirements for restructuring if this is not done.

Members are also reminded that it is still possible to pay recruitment and retention incentives, but that this should be standardised and built into the school's pay policy. For details see section 54 of the School Teachers' Pay and Conditions document, available on Teachernet.

For other questions or concerns on restructuring and consultation, please call the SHA hotline on 0116 299 1122.