Staff intranet

Market supplements scheme

Introduction

The council’s resourcing strategy is aimed at maintaining a high calibre workforce with the skills, competencies, knowledge and experience to deliver a diverse range of excellent services and to meet its many objectives. This Market Supplement Scheme is one of a range of initiatives available to managers within the resourcing strategy aimed at resolving recruitment and / or retention difficulties.

There are times when the council’s grading and pay of a post does not match the market rates and that results in the inability to successfully recruit or retain staff. In such cases it may be appropriate to pay a market supplement in addition to the salary to ensure that the essential post is filled. The Council is committed to the principles of equal pay for work of equal value and uses job evaluation and job families to measure the relative values of all jobs. However a market supplement is lawful under the Equality Act 2010 where there is evidence to justify that market factors are the “material factor” for the post attracting a higher rate of pay than other posts graded similarly.

The appropriate application of this procedure will help to ensure that the council retains the flexibility to award incentives to recruit and retain staff in areas where there are particular difficulties. It is not designed to reward individual performance and anticipation of a problem or the potential resignation of a key individual is not enough evidence to warrant a market supplement.

The objectives of this scheme are to make sure that the council:

  • recruits and retains the best staff for each post in an externally competitive market but in an internally fair manner.
  • complies with equal pay legislation and is not discriminatory in applying a market supplement to a post.
  • provides a fair and transparent system for considering payments of a market supplement where a recruitment and/or retention problem has been identified

Scope

This scheme is designed to regulate the use of market supplements, and is available to all posts within Cumberland Council. The payment of a market supplement is a temporary measure and is not a contractual right.