Prospect National Conference 2026: Organising Awards

The Organising Awards is one of the highlights of National Conference, where we celebrate the branches and individual reps who have gone above and beyond in helping members, making a difference in their workplaces and achieving campaign successes.

This year’s winners were:

Small Branch Award: Postal Museum

Staff in one area of The Postal Museum were facing challenging working conditions due to the lack of a proper cooling system. The issue was seriously impacting staff wellbeing and overall quality of life at work.

Staff reached out to Prospect for support and launched a 3 week heat petition campaign to highlight how strongly staff felt about the issue. The petition quickly gained cross-departmental support, with members volunteering their time to raise awareness and encourage colleagues to stand together.

As a result, significant improvements have been made to working conditions in the Welcome Space. It was a clear demonstration of the power of a collective voice.

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Medium Branch Award: College of Policing

The exceptional dedication and leadership of Stephen, Elaine and Gemma have transformed the Prospect College of Policing Branch, significantly strengthening its recruitment, campaigning and organising capabilities.

As a result, the branch has grown to become the largest and most influential trade union at the College, with a proven ability to shape and influence organisational decision-making.

It has recently secured enhanced recognition terms, strengthening Prospect’s collective bargaining position and further embedding the union’s role and standing within the workplace. This progress ensures the branch is well-positioned to make the most of the Employment Rights Act and to continue delivering for both existing and future members.

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Large Branch Award: Victoria and Albert Museum

Storehouse Branch secretary Sabrina Offord organised a multi-department campaign after an recruitment drive resulted in 95% density in V&A Storehouse.

Sabrina alongside Holly Stepp from the archives team identified two leaders in the Collections Access team and successfully recruited them both resulting in 100% of the 19 person team joining in just two weeks.

Through collective pressure on management such as badge days, mass reporting, and in person meetings, the members won material changes to their locker room, the right to eat hot food in the break room, a sofa, regular seated rotations, anti-fatigue mats for standing staff and regular meetings with management on health  and safety.

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Individual Organising Award: Keith Cookson, Royal Shakespeare Company

Keith has been working incredibly hard for the past year, and before then. He is very personable and able to build effective relationships with members and managers quickly. A recent significant achievement include leading the 2025 pay negotiations that secured a 3-year pay deal despite the company being in a financially precarious position.

He has only been union steward for the RSC since May 2024, but since then he has managed to almost triple the membership at the RSC.

One of his most significant achievements in the past year is having built such strong relationships with senior leaders that he convinced the CEO and Director of people to grant company-wide collective recognition.

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Individual Organising Award: Sam Pearse and Adam Williamson, Air Traffic Controllers (ATCOs)

The air traffic controllers at Newcastle Airport are Prospect members but the recognition agreement for the airport was held by Unite and Unison, due to the fact they represent other airport staff such as security and the airport fire service. The air traffic control department was viewed as ‘just another’ department of the airport but neither of these unions have expertise in this field.

Since 2019 our members there have been seeking recognition for Prospect, and Prospect handles personal cases on behalf of our members there. Through a recruitment campaign by Sam and Adam at Newcastle, membership density reached 100%.

Through their campaigning, the nominees organised a petition for the employer to recognise Prospect, however thisr was deemed ‘unworkable’ by management. The nominees continued to meet with management, to convince them that the controllers were serious about recognition.

A formal ballot for action short of a strike to push the employer to recognise Prospect was won with a 95% yes vote on a 95% turnout. It was only then that management engaged with Prospect and duly signed a recognition agreement. Their fantastic organising ability, tenacious approach and dogged determination not to give up on the issue, resulted in the fantastic outcome of recognition for our members at Newcastle, increasing Prospect’s profile further in aviation.

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Young Member Award: Lauren Johnstone, Atomic Weapons Establishment

Lauren has been the Young Workers’ Network branch representative for AWE since 2021 and over the last five years she has shown extraordinary dedication and commitment to improving engagement with young workers at AWE, increasing the profile of the YWN membership and improving communications with different groups of workers.

Her achievements include leading negotiations with management to specifically review and improve pay for those on the dedicated graduate programme at AWE, resulting in improved pay benchmarked against other similar employers; organisation and delivery of the young workers fortnight, delivering a total of six dedicated events; and starting a sub-committee for young workers among AWE’s Prospect membership, to provide a regular open forum to discuss concerns and challenges.

Since April 2024, the YWN membership has made up one third of the total membership at AWE, which is the largest proportion it has been in some years. Much of this increased will be down to the work of branch and the activities which Lauren has led.

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Branch Equality Award: National Grid Electricity Distribution

Since last conference the branch has established an equalities network, which has introduced new members to union activity. The Network undertook a survey with the help of Prospect’s Head of Research Jonathan Green which was very comprehensive and it highlighted some equalities issues faced by members in particular members with disabilities.

The network and branch acted on this with reps undertaking training on reasonable adjustments and how to support members with disabilities.  The network is still in relative infancy with more work to do, however, this award  acknowledges the branch’s commitment and congratulates them on what has already been achieved.

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Individual Equality Award: Alex Pitsillos, Office for Nuclear Regulation

Alex Pitsillos has been a tireless campaigner for gender equality in ONR since she first became active in the union. Despite being a junior member of staff, she has regularly gone toe-to-toe directly with the CEO on the gender equality issues, never afraid to stand up for members despite the power differential and the fact she entered this challenging role with little union experience.  She has done this as additional duties on top of an already challenging and time-consuming job.

Her achievements include: Establishing the first ONR Gender Equality Network, which was so impactful, it was recognised in a Parliamentary report on ONR; delivering a union-supported campaign on workplace allyship, that was so well-received that the employer developed an allyship training course; and securing an explicit sexual harassment policy from the employer, making the case for this well before recent legal changes.

She is now secretary of the branch and continues to pursue EDI issues with vigour, while taking on the wider aspects of branch leadership.

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Helping and Advising Members Award: Lee Austin, Babcock

Lee has been a rep for more than two years and works in a very busy environment consisting of around 200 staff members, many of whom are members. Lee has a holistic approach to problem solving and has consistently provided support for our members. His efforts do not go unnoticed and he will often be approached by non-members about joining the branch.

Lee attends new starter events as well as environmental working groups and is skilled in keeping members and potential members informed without detriment to our existing members. Lee has successfully supported our members in investigation meetings and is also involved in the branch pay negotiation meetings.

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Handling Personal Cases Award: Amanda Hoyle, Sellafield

Amanda, as the lead rep for Sellafield, she runs the case handling for a branch with over 5400 members, organising case handlers when cases come in and running our monthly case handler meetings.

Amanda also works on many cases herself including senior managers, while doing her day job of being a full time workplace rep.

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Handling Personal Cases Award: Gary O’Connor, DVSA

Gary consistently demonstrates an exceptional level of professionalism and dedication in his role which is widely recognised by union members and the employer. He possesses an impressive wealth of knowledge and applies this effectively to support members through numerous complex and challenging cases.

His case handling is thorough, principled, and member focused, ensuring that individuals receive fair representation and confidence throughout difficult processes.  A key strength of Gary’s work is his ability to ensure that the DVSA strictly follows agreed policies and procedures.

He is diligent in holding management to account, safeguarding members’ rights, and upholding the integrity of union agreements. This has led to positive outcomes for members and reinforced trust in union representation.  Beyond individual cases, Gary goes above and beyond by sharing his expertise with others. Gary’s commitment, experience, and willingness to support both members and colleagues make him an invaluable asset to the union.