Your 2024 Amey pay claim

Your pay claim 2024

Thanks to every member who had a say in our 2024 Amey pay survey. Your responses have helped to strengthen our democratic mandate to demand improvements from the company.

Your reps have met to discuss your results and to agree the claim for improvements to pay and conditions which we have set out in a pay claim document, available online here. This document will form the basis of our negotiating position when we meet with company representatives to seek improvements which would be effective from the 1 March anniversary date. 

For more information and support with access to your MyTSSA account, visit your MyTSSA Account.

Fact or fiction? "Inflation is coming down" 

As in previous years, the claim seeks an increase which protects your wages from the ongoing increases in living costs you have continued to experienced over the last twelve months and that we anticipate for the year to come.

Although many commentators have described inflation as "falling", this does not reflect that reality that you have to live with when you pay your bills or do a weekly shop.

The graph above illustrates that the % RPI rate of inflation (orange line, https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/inflationandpriceindices/timeseries/czbh/mm23) has been slowing from a forty-year high, back to a level similar to autumn 2021. This does not mean that inflation is falling, only that it is accelerating less quickly than it was. This trend is analogous to driving an accelerating car if you set off with the pedal on the floor, at maximum acceleration, then reduce the acceleration before you have reached top speed. Your speed will still be increasing, but not as rapidly as it was. Although your rate of acceleration is coming down, your speed is not, and you are certainly not going backwards!

Many public discussions on inflation misunderstand or mislead on this point to suggest that "things are getting cheaper". If this were the case, we would see a trend that is analogous to our car travelling in reverse, moving back to where it was previously, with goods being cheaper and the value of your wages increasing in relation to your living costs. Over time, this would result in a negative (i.e. minus) percentage.

The Blue line represents the RPI index, as opposed to the rate. This shows whether things are getting more or less expensive to indicate the relative value of money (i.e. wages) (https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/inflationandpriceindices/timeseries/chaw/mm23). As the graph shows, although the rate is speeding up less rapidly than it was, the index is continuing to increase as costs continue to rise and the value of your wages continues to be eroded.

In the graph, 100 represents the cost of a typical basket of goods and services in 1987, which has increased from under 300 in 2021, to almost 380 in late 2023.

This clearly demonstrates that prices are continuing to increase, they are only rising less rapidly than they were in recent months.

The cost is increasing and is over 20 points higher than when the RPI % rate peaked in October 2022, meaning that the real-terms value of your wages, or buying power of your money, is less now than it was when RPI was generally understood to have "peaked".

Other elements of our claim 

The claim document sets out improvements which TSSA members identified as priorities in our survey, as well as TSSA national policies determined by our annual conference. Click here to view the full claim, including:

• a demand for job security through no compulsory redundancies
• improved pension arrangements
• a comprehensive review of policies, to ensure that members are treated fairly and equitably at all stages in their career
• long overdue progress to a 35 hour week
• 30 day basic annual leave entitlement
• Collectively bargained contracts for all grades covered by our collective agreements
• Negotiated agreement on a sustainable workplace framework agreement
• Amey to sign off the the TUC "Dying to Work" campaign
• An agreed menopause policy
• Amey to commit to supplying free period products

Your reps will meet with the company soon to formally present our claim. The ball will then be in Amey's court to respond with a reasonable offer to your representatives. Please look out for updates as negotiations continue. 

The power of your negotiating team to secure a good deal for members is entirely based on the collective strength and organisation of our membership in Amey. Please encourage your colleagues to join your union today and to help secure a good deal for you and your families.