External Employee Relations Support for UKAEA

Description

Within recent years, UKAEA has grown dramatically to meet the UK Government’s ambitions for Fusion Energy. This growth has been coupled with a number of large-scale programmes being delivered, including Fusion Futures and STEP. In 2024 the JET Decommissioning Programme was initiated, representing a shift from JET operations for the last 40 years, with accompanying changes required for the workforce. To provide support, UKAEA has an ER team consisting of approximately four (4) members. The awarded supplier will be required to work closely with the ER team on specific cases. The ER team will continue to lead on all ER case work, but the awarded supplier may be asked to lead on ER matters where there is a conflict of interest for UKAEA. There may be a requirement to liaise with our in-house legal team. At UKAEA we handle highly complex employee relations matters, these are often due to the nature of our business, which employs highly technical and skilled workers, we also employ apprentices some of whom are under 18-year-old. UKAEA also has a highly neurodiverse workforce. Our policies and procedures are contractual, and we are also a unionised environment. As a government organisation, we are subject to additional restrictions, which means that certain options, such as paying settlements or providing Payment in Lieu of Notice (PILON), are not available for resolving employee disputes.