UCU negotiators are meeting the employer representative UCEA today for further talks - but we need to see significantly more movement than employers have promised so far.
UCU negotiators have set out clear, reasonable targets for UCEA to improve the offer they made in January:
🔘Each institution needs time-bound, public action plans/agreements on workload, equality and job security
🔘Action plans should be implemented in collaboration with unions
On workload, institutions need accurate, realistic, comprehensive workload models that reflect the number of hours staff actually work.
On casualisation, we need firmer commitments on:
🔘Ending zero hours contracts
🔘Converting staff from fixed-term to secure contracts
🔘Converting hourly paid staff to fractional contracts.
On top of this, institutions need to provide better data than they currently do via @ukhesa to monitor progress and illustrate any ongoing problems regarding equality pay gaps, overwork, and precarious employment.
Our demands are completely reasonable and far from unaffordable - it is the employers who are at fault for continuing this dispute.
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@DrJoGrady UCU general secretary @DrJoGrady on the pay and working conditions dispute in higher education and the ongoing marking and assessment boycott at 145 universities
"From the Colton Weavers who were murdered fighting against wage cuts in the 18th century to the Women’s Peace Crusade activists who took a stand against the slaughter of WW1.
And, more recently, the heroes who stopped an immigration raid in Pollokshields just two years ago." ✊
Jo turns first to the USS dispute, telling delegates:
"Today, thanks to your bravery and determination, your steadfastness on picket lines, in the face of freezing winds and vindictive employers we are on the verge of seeing our retirement benefits restored, in full."
UCU Congress 2023 is underway with an opening address from our President @janetfarrarUCU:
"It’s been quite a year to be UCU’s first Goth President. The biggest ever FE strikes in England with the prospect of even bigger action to come."
"I have to take the time to say how very proud I am of my own branch at The Manchester College. They have had a renewed energy over the last year or so, a huge upsurge in membership and are fighting back against the terrible pay we have in FE." ✊
Janet now turns to her visit to Colombia last month:
"We went up into the mountains and met with former combatant peasants rebuilding their community brick by brick. It really brought home the huge importance of international solidarity."
Q: Do you support UCU members being formally consulted on the proposals that have been reached with UCEA on pay, ending zero hour contracts, workloads, casualisation and closing equality pay gaps?
Q: Do you support UCU members being formally consulted on the proposals that have been reached with UCEA on pay, ending zero hour contracts, workloads, casualisation and closing equality pay gaps?
Members in both disputes (mostly pre-92 universities):
Yes: 76%
No: 24%