Decision

Acceptance Decision

Updated 20 November 2025

Applies to England, Scotland and Wales

Case Number: TUR1/1501(2025)

20 November 2025

CENTRAL ARBITRATION COMMITTEE

TRADE UNION AND LABOUR RELATIONS (CONSOLIDATION) ACT 1992

SCHEDULE A1 - COLLECTIVE BARGAINING: RECOGNITION

DECISION ON WHETHER TO ACCEPT THE APPLICATION

The Parties:

NEU & NASUWT

and

Inspire Academy Movement Trust

1. Introduction

1)         NEU & NASUWT (the Unions) submitted an application to the CAC on 28 October 2025 that they should be recognised for collective bargaining by Inspire Academy Movement Trust (the Employer) for a bargaining unit comprising “Teaching staff (including ECTs but excluding visiting teachers) employed by Inspire Academy Movement Trust.” The location of the bargaining unit was given as “Seal Church of England Primary School, Zambra Way, Seal, Kent, TN15 0DJ. Maypole Primary School, Franklin Road, Dartford, DA2 7UZ. Four Elms Primary School, Bough Beech Road, Four Elms, Kent, TN8 6NE. Rusthall St Paul’s Church of England Primary School, High St, Royal Tunbridge Wells, Tunbridge Wells TN4 8RZ.” The CAC gave all parties notice of receipt of the application on 28 October 2025. The Employer submitted a response to the CAC dated 6 November 2025 which was copied to the Unions.

2)         In accordance with section 263 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 (the Act), the CAC Chair established a Panel to deal with the case. The Panel consisted of Professor Alan Bogg, Panel Chair, and, as Members, Mr Mustafa Faruqi and Mr Paul Noon. The Case Manager appointed to support the Panel was Joanne Curtis.

2. Issues

3)         The Panel is required by paragraph 15 of Schedule A1 to the Act (the Schedule) to decide whether the Unions’ application to the CAC is valid within the terms of paragraphs 5 to 9; is made in accordance with paragraphs 11 or 12; is admissible within the terms of paragraphs 33 to 42; and therefore, should be accepted.

3. The Unions’ application

4)         In their application the Unions said that they had written to the Employer with a formal request for recognition on 6 October 2025. The Unions said that the Employer did not respond. A copy of the Unions’ letter of 6 October 2025 was attached to the application.

5)         According to the Unions, it was estimated that there were around 190 workers employed by the Employer with 65 of these falling within the proposed bargaining unit.  When asked to state the number of members in the proposed bargaining unit the Unions said “NEU - 41 NASUWT – 12. Membership information can be made available to the CAC on request for verification.” When asked to provide evidence that a majority of the workers in the proposed bargaining unit were likely to support recognition for collective bargaining, the Unions said, “The overwhelming majority of employees in the proposed bargaining unit are members of the NEU/NASUWT.”

6)         When asked to give their reasons for selecting the proposed bargaining unit, the Unions stated “The overwhelming majority of members of the NEU/NASUWT employed by the employer are employed as teachers. Teachers are a distinct body of employees at the school who are employed on ‘teacher’ contracts. Teachers are required to undertake specific duties (planning and delivering lessons and assessing students) and are renumerated according to a specific pay scale.” The Unions confirmed that the bargaining unit had not been agreed with the Employer.

7)         The Unions confirmed that they had current certificates of independence and, when asked to provide any available evidence that the unions concerned would cooperate with each other and enter single table bargaining arrangements the Unions stated “Officials from each union have already been in close communication to discuss this application. NEU and NASUWT have previously submitted a number of joint applications previously which have been accepted by the CAC.” The Unions stated that they copied the application and supporting documents to the Employer on 28 October 2025.

8)         Finally, the Unions said there had not been a previous application in respect of this or a similar bargaining unit and there was no existing recognition agreement that covered any of the workers in the proposed bargaining unit.

4. The Employer’s response to the Unions’ application

9)         The Employer stated that it had received the Unions’ formal request for recognition on 6 October 2025. When asked what its response was, the Employer stated “I did not respond at the time as we were experiencing technical issues with the broadband and cloud. I was unable to access emails and those that did come in were not immediately seen once we were back online.”

10)       When asked to give the date it received a copy of the application form directly from the Unions, the Employer stated this was 31 October 2025.^{[footnote 1]} The Employer confirmed that it had not agreed the bargaining unit prior to having received a copy of the completed application form. The Employer said that the number of workers in the proposed bargaining unit identified by the Unions was incorrect and that the Trust had a total of 37 teachers.

11)       The Employer stated that it employed 152 workers. The Employer again reiterated that it did not agree with the number of workers in the bargaining unit as defined in the Unions’ application and said that “the union have stated 65 in the bargaining unit (teachers) we have 37 teachers, and not all are part of a union.” When asked if it disagreed with the Unions’ estimate of membership in the proposed bargaining unit the Employer said “the application suggests they have 53 members, we only have 37 teachers (I appreciate Not all members may be teachers, but not as many as 16 support staff would be a member of a teacher union). I believe they may not have up to date records and are counting people that may have left.

12)       When asked to give reasons if it did not consider that a majority of the workers in the bargaining unit were likely to support recognition, the Employer said, “Seal have an active union presence, however the other schools do not. The other schools work closely with leaders regardless. The vote would be heavily weighted at Seal.”

13)       The Employer confirmed that there was no recognition agreement in place covering any of the workers in the proposed bargaining unit. When asked whether, following receipt of the Unions’ request, the Employer had proposed that Acas be requested to assist, the Employer answered, “no.”

14)       Finally, when asked if it was aware of any previous application under the Schedule by the Union in respect of this or a similar bargaining unit the Employer answered, “in the last academic year, Seal’s rep emailed to ask if we would consider an agreement. This was taken to the board of directors, and it was felt at the time that we were working well with the union and supported the activities; therefore, we felt at the time there was not a need to enter into an agreement.”

15)       In an email dated 7 November 2025 the Employer said that it had re checked the teacher figures provided in its response dated 6 November 2025 “and including every employee on a teacher contract this gives 57 workers, broken down as follows:

Seal: 20

Maypole: 18

Four Elms: 7

Rusthall: 10

Central Team: 2.”

5. The Unions comments on the Employer’s response document

16)       The Unions said that the Employer had acknowledged that a valid request had been received and that the Employer had failed to respond within 10 working days. The Unions said that despite the Employer saying that it did not agree with the bargaining unit it did not give a reason only that it disagreed with the numbers rather than the description. The Unions said that following further clarification the Employer had confirmed that it had 57 teachers as opposed to the 37 originally stated. The Unions said they accepted this figure rather than their figure of 65 which was only an estimate. The Unions said that with a revised bargaining unit size of 57 it was possible that its previous submission of 53 union members within the proposed bargaining unit was correct and that full membership records could be provided to the CAC to verify as part of a membership check. The Unions concluded by saying “the employer’s assertion that only one workplace has an active union presence is not correct. Our membership records demonstrate that we have proportionate membership levels distributed evenly across all workplaces in the Trust.”

6. The membership and support check

17)       To assist the determination of two of the admissibility criteria specified in the Schedule, namely, whether 10% of the workers in the proposed bargaining unit are members of the unions (paragraph 36(1)(a)) and whether a majority of the workers in the proposed bargaining unit would be likely to favour recognition of the unions as entitled to conduct collective bargaining on behalf of the bargaining unit (paragraph 36(1)(b)), the Panel proposed an independent check of the level of union membership within the proposed bargaining unit.  It was agreed with the parties that the Employer would supply to the Case Manager a list of the names, dates of birth and job titles of workers within the proposed bargaining unit, and that the Unions would supply to the Case Manager a list of their paid up members within that unit including their full names and dates of birth. It was explicitly agreed with both parties that, to preserve confidentiality, the respective lists would not be copied to the other party and that agreement was confirmed in a letter dated 10 November 2025 from the Case Manager to all parties. The information from the Employer was received by the CAC on 11 November 2025, and from the Unions on 12 November 2025. 

18)       The list supplied by the Employer contained the names of 60 workers and the list of members supplied by the Unions contained 53 names.

19)       According to the Case Manager’s report, the number of union members in the proposed bargaining unit was 43, a membership level of 71.67%. A report of the result of the membership check was circulated to the Panel and the parties on 12 November 2025 and the parties’ comments invited. The Panel is satisfied that this check was conducted properly and impartially and in accordance with the agreement reached with the parties.

7. Parties’ comments on the membership check

20)       In an email dated 12 November 2025 the Unions said “the results of the membership report clearly satisfy the test laid out in paragraph 36. Therefore, the unions are of the view that the panel should accept TUR1/1501(2025) and automatically award statutory recognition for the specified bargaining unit.”

21)       In an email dated 18 November 2025 the Employer said that it did not have any comments to make on the contents of the report. The Employer did raise the question of whether senior leaders including the CEO were included in the bargaining rights. The Unions responded by saying “our bargaining unit refers to those employed on ‘teacher’ contracts. That would be those members of staff paid on the teaching pay scale (in this case the Leadership Pay Scale). It also includes those members of staff directed to perform teacher duties as defined by the School Teachers Pay and Conditions.” The Unions went on to say “the bargaining unit could also be defined as all members of staff granted access to the Teachers’ Pension Scheme (TPS). If the CEO is employed on contractual terms that correspond to those outlined above, then we would consider this position to be within the bargaining unit. That said, we are open to the employer’s views on this. Should the employer wish for the CEO to be excluded we would agree to this.”

8. Considerations

22)       In determining whether to accept the application the Panel must decide whether the admissibility and validity provisions referred to in paragraph 3 of this decision are satisfied. The Panel has considered all the evidence submitted by the parties in reaching its decision.

23)       The Panel is satisfied that the application is not rendered inadmissible by any of the provisions in paragraphs 33 to 35 and paragraphs 37 to 42 and that it was made in accordance with paragraph 11 of the Schedule. The remaining issue for the Panel to address is whether the admissibility criteria set out in paragraph 36(1) of the Schedule are met.

Paragraph 36(1)(a)

24.       In accordance with paragraph 36(1)(a) of the Schedule the Panel must determine whether members of the Unions constitute at least 10% of the workers in the Unions’ proposed bargaining unit. In this case the check of membership established that there were 43 members in a 60-worker bargaining unit giving a combined membership density of 71.67%. 

Paragraph 36(1)(b)

25)       The test in paragraph 36(1)(b) is whether a majority of the workers constituting the proposed bargaining unit would be likely to favour recognition of the Unions as entitled to conduct collective bargaining on behalf of the bargaining unit. Given that 71.67% of the bargaining unit are members of the Unions, the Panel is satisfied that, in accordance with paragraph 36(1)(b) of the Schedule, on the balance of probabilities, a majority of the workers in the proposed bargaining unit would be likely to favour recognition of the Unions.

9. Decision

26)       For the reasons given above, the Panel’s decision is that the application is accepted by the CAC.

Panel

Professor Alan Bogg, Panel Chair

Mr Mustafa Faruqi

Mr Paul Noon OBE

20 November 2025

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1. The e mail dated 28 October 2025 received by the CAC from the Unions attaching their application for statutory recognition was cc’d to the Employer. ↩