Kevin Rowan has been appointed Director of Dispute Resolution at the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service (Acas).
Kevin will lead Acas's work across the country to resolve workplace disputes. He joins from the TUC where he was Head of Organising, Services and Learning since 2013. Kevin has previously served on the Acas Council.
Acas Interim Chief Executive Dan Ellis said:
"I am pleased to welcome Kevin to his new role at Acas. Kevin brings with him a huge wealth of experience and understands the key role Acas can play in helping resolve workplace disputes quickly.
"Acas's conciliation service is incredibly successful at resolving disputes. With the cost of workplace conflict estimated to be £30 billion per year, finding solutions to problems before they escalate to formal action is crucial.
"I look forward to working with Kevin to continue Acas's excellent dispute resolution service that consistently evolves to meet the changing needs of customers."
Kevin Rowan said:
"I am really looking forward to building on the success of Acas's dispute resolution service and Acas's critical role as a partner to help deliver the Government's Make Work Pay plan.
"Acas experts handle hundreds of collective disputes throughout the year between employers and groups of workers with a high settlement rate. Its individual dispute resolution service helps to resolve potential employment tribunal claims and has dealt with over one million cases in the last decade.
"It is a tremendous achievement and I'm proud to be heading up such a talented and hard-working team."
In 2023 to 2024, Acas conciliated in over 600 collective disputes and resolved or progressed 94% of them.
Acas received over 100,000 Early Conciliation notifications in 2023 to 2024 for its individual dispute resolution service which helps to resolve potential tribunal claims, with fewer than 10% of early conciliation cases progressing to a tribunal hearing.
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Background notes
- Estimating the costs of workplace conflict
- Kevin Rowan – Kevin was TUC Head of Organising, Services and Learning for over 10 years. Prior to that, he was Regional Secretary of the Northern TUC and Director of unionlearn, the TUC's learning and skills organisation responsible for union learning, the Union Learning Fund (ULF) and TUC Education; the TUC's extensive programme of workplace representatives' training. He will start his new role in March 2025 and will take over from Kate Nowicki who is retiring.
- Acas annual report and accounts 2023 to 2024