University strikes begin after bosses refuse to budge on pensions, pay & working conditions, says UCU

• Staff at 58 UK universities are walking out for three consecutive days from today (Wednesday) to Friday 3 December
• Employers have misled staff over the size of pension cuts and rejected UCU’s reasonable demands to address falling pay and worsening working conditions
• UCU says that action will escalate in new year if employers continue to ignore staff demands

Three consecutive days of strike action will hit 58 universities starting today (Wednesday) after university bosses and their representatives refused to withdraw pension cuts or address falling pay and worsening working conditions [NOTE 1].

After notifying vice chancellors that staff would take strike action unless they saw movement, UCU continued to meet with employer representatives Universities UK (UUK) over pension cuts, but UUK refused to reverse them.

On pay and working conditions, meanwhile, employers, represented by University and Colleges Employers Association (UCEA) still won’t meet without preconditions, and refuse to engage in agreeing action plans that would address widespread casualisation, excessive workloads and pay inequalities. UCEA has also refused to move on another below inflation pay offer for staff.

Last month UCU members at 58 institutions backed strike action in two separate ballots, one over pension cuts and one over pay & working conditions [NOTE 2]. Research by the National Union of Students shows 73% of students support university staff taking strike action. 42 branches that just failed to meet the Conservative anti trade union threshold of 50% are being reballoted to join escalating action next year.

This week, UCU exposed how UUK had misled staff and vice chancellors about the true scale of the cuts they were pushing through. UUK had repeatedly said that its cuts to the Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS) pension would lead to staff pensions being cut by 10% to 18%. This was a claim communicated by UUK to university senior managers, and in turn university staff, in attempts to persuade them not to take action. However, the USS trustee’s own modelling shows that a typical member will see a 36% pension cut.

Staff pay has fallen by 20% after twelve years of below inflation pay offers whilst almost 90,000 academic and academic-related staff are employed on insecure contracts.

The gender pay gap in UK universities sits at 15%, whilst the disability pay gap is 9% and the race pay gap is 17%, staff are also experiencing a crisis of work-related stress with over half showing probable signs of depression.

To resolve the pension dispute UCU is demanding employers revoke their pensions cuts. To resolve the pay & working conditions dispute UCU is demanding a £2.5k pay increase for all staff, as well as action to tackle unmanageable workloads, pay inequality and insecure contracts that blight the sector.

UCU general secretary Jo Grady said: ‘It is deeply regrettable that staff have been forced into taking industrial action again, but sadly university bosses have shown little interest in negotiating in good faith and addressing the serious concerns of staff over falling pay, massive pension cuts, equality pay gaps and the rampant use of insecure contracts.

‘The truth is that staff are asking for the bare minimum in a sector awash with money. But sadly, the only time vice chancellors seem to listen is when staff take action, and those leading our universities should not underestimate their determination to change this sector for the better.

‘We are grateful to all the students who are supporting staff taking industrial action because they understand that staff working conditions are student learning conditions. Vice-chancellors now need to concentrate on asking themselves why strikes have become an annual occurrence and seek to resolve this dispute in order to avoid more needless disruption to learning. If they continue to ignore the modest demands of staff then we will be forced to take further industrial action in the new year, which even more branches will join.’

NOTES

Regional releases with local picket information for every university seeing strike action will be released shortly.

UCU general secretary Jo Grady is available for prerecorded interviews on Tuesday 30 December and for interviews throughout the three days of strike action.

[1] 33 institutions will see strikes over both pay and pensions:

Aston University

Birkbeck, UoL    

Durham University          

Goldsmiths, UoL              

Heriot-Watt University   

Keele University

King's College London    

London School of Economics      

London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine

Loughborough University             

Open University

Royal Holloway, UoL      

SOAS, UoL          

The University of Birmingham     

The University of Dundee             

The University of Kent    

The University of Leeds  

The University of Nottingham     

The University of Sheffield           

The University of Stirling

University of Bradford    

University of Bristol        

University of Cambridge

University of Edinburgh  

University of Essex          

University of Glasgow    

University of Lancaster  

University of Liverpool   

University of St Andrews

University of Sussex        

University of York            

Queens University Belfast            

University of Ulster         

21 will see strikes over pay only:

Courtauld Institute of Art

Edinburgh Napier University

Glasgow School of Art

Greenwich University

Kingston University

Liverpool Hope University

Manchester Metropolitan University

Queen Margaret University

Roehampton University

Royal College of Art

Royal Northern College of Music

Sheffield Hallam University

The University of Manchester

The University of Northampton

The University of Salford

University of the Arts London

University College London

University of Brighton

University of Central Lancashire

University of Chester

University of Leicester

Four will see strikes over pensions only:

Institute of Development Studies 

Imperial College London 

University of Bath 

University of Reading

[2] In the pension ballot, 76% of UCU members who voted backed strike action and 88% voted in favour of action short of strike. In the pay & working conditions ballot more than seven in 10 members who voted (70.1%) backed strike action with 85% (84.9%) voting for action short of strike.

The overall turnout on the pension ballot was 53% and on pay & conditions was 51%. The ballot was disaggregated and 42 branches that just failed to meet the Conservative anti trade union threshold of 50% are being reballoted to join escalating action next year.