Short 🧵: There's a lot of chat right now about devolved & local welfare (inc from me!) In Scotland this conversation grew due to the Smith Commission's devolved powers. Today is an e.g. of why devolved welfare needs to be understood alongside intergovernmental relations (1/9) We've had many years up here of tense & often conflicting political views on welfare provisions. Arguably, the reason Scotland has some differing social security policies is because of a political desire to do welfare differently to (a then) Conservative UK Gov (2/9)

UUK say ppl want precarious contracts in HE. Really? After my phd I spent 7 yrs on fixed term research contracts. “Luckily” projects arose that I was qualified for so I had 6 renewals, 6 redundancy experiences. How do you mentally & financially manage this situation? #UCUstrike 1. Save save save. The individual absorbs the social risk of redundancy. Uni pay the bare minimum redundancy (after 2 yrs) . Save as much as possible, live in cheap housing, rely on partner’s wage. (Obvs inequalities issues galore, esp as #firstgen & #workingclassacademic)

Thread: Lots of the reasons for striking focus on students & teaching. This is important. But there are university workers doing lots of other important work, including research. 68% of researchers are on fixed-term contracts, many for 1 or 2 years & it's hard-going... #UCUstrike 1. You do the research job that is in the job outline, but on top of that you MUST also do a number of things to get a new job. Just doing the job listed in the description (even if you're a legend at it) does not get you a renewal or a new contract/project at the end #UCUstrikes