UCU

With terms drawing to a close in mid-December, university campuses are becoming much quieter places, and will remain so until early-mid January. Whilst taking much-needed respite following the end of a busy term and kicking off industrial action, University and College Union (UCU) activists and supporters now have ideal opportunities to build our actions into next term. There are five clear things activists should focus on: recruiting to the union; mobilising members to take part in “action short of a strike” (ASOS) and join next term’s pickets; getting more branches out; building solidarity...

A number of countries, including the US and France, are seeing waves or flurries of strikes as workers try to gain or make up ground as economies revive after lockdowns. Here, pay in the private sector is rising but inflation is rising faster, with the left-Blairite Resolution Foundation noting that "real wages are already falling and are likely to continue to do so for the next six months”. In the public sector the government is seeking to impose even more real-terms cuts after more than a decade of huge cumulative losses. There is a wave of attacks on pay, terms and conditions as bosses try...

With one week remaining of the three weeks of strike at Goldsmiths University of London (23 November to 13 December), the local branch of the University and College Union (UCU) is planning an escalation of its dispute against management’s threatened 52 job cuts, part of an extensive “fire and rehire” plan, alongside radical restructuring at the college which will see further cuts. Already the branch has requested the national union apply an academic boycott on Goldsmiths. The national union will back up the local dispute by asking for a range of actions which might include asking external...

University staff walked out for three days on 1-3 December as national disputes kicked off over pensions, pay and conditions. Fifty-eight universities are taking action: some over proposed cuts to the USS pension scheme, some over the national claim on pay, workload, equalities and casualisation, and some in both disputes. The cuts to pensions would see a typical member facing a thirty-six per cent cut to guaranteed pension provision, while pay has fallen by 20% in real terms over the past twelve years thanks to below-inflation pay rises. Many casualised staff shared stories of precarious...

A week into three weeks of strike action at Goldsmiths University of London (23 November to 13 December), the local branch of the University and College Union (UCU) is now looking at ways to escalate and diversify the dispute. For example, the branch plans to request the national union applies an academic boycott on Goldsmiths. If agreed, the national union will back up the local dispute, now that it is facing management intransigence, by asking for external academics to avoid contact with the university in a smaller or larger range of ways. That could include: not speaking and lecturing at...

In 58 University and College Union (UCU) branches across the UK, strikes kick off on Wednesday 1 December for an initial period of three days, to 3 December. From 1 December onwards, indefinitely, UCU members in those branches and others where they won ballot mandates for it will also be doing “action short of strikes” (ASOS). Detailed info here The disputes have been called over a range of issues, split into two industrial disputes: cuts to the USS pension scheme, and the Four Fights (over falling pay, increasing casualisation and workload, and worsening campus inequality). In Higher...

AWL Higher Education workers fraction have produced this bulletin for the UCU strikes on 1-3 December 2021. Please download and read - and distribute if you agree! Let us know what you think - email awl@workersliberty.org . We have members in UCU and Unison and hold regular meetings to discuss building a democratic, fighting rank and file across campus unions.

Three weeks of strike action began at Goldsmiths University of London on Tuesday 23 November with picketing, a strike rally and the start of an extensive teach-out programme. The first day of action was the culmination of weeks of preparation, and the product of a determination to beat redundancies and damaging restructuring at the college. The day before the strike, Goldsmiths Warden (top manager) Frances Corner issued a disingenuous message (one of many) urging University and College Union (UCU) members to call off their strike, claiming that she is listening, and implying UCU are being...

Members of the University and College Union (UCU) across fifty-eight universities will strike on 1-3 December in two parallel national disputes. In some (primarily older, pre-92) institutions the strike is over a cut to pensions that could see members lose up to 35% of guaranteed benefits on top of previous substantial cuts. In others the focus of the dispute is on the “Four Fights”: pay, equality, casualisation, and workload. Some universities are striking in both disputes. Over the past twelve years, pay has fallen twenty per cent in real terms due to below-inflation rises, at the same time...

On 4-5 November, the University and College Union (UCU) announced the results of two national ballots. Higher Education (HE) sector members were balloted on two disputes: the long-running “USS” pensions issue, and the “Four Fights”: pay, workload, casualisation, and inequality. Most of the workers involved are are insecure jobs, with long hours and modest pay. Their cause is essentially the same as that of the NHS workers consulting on action to improve their 3% pay deal, the local government workers voting on strikes against the 1.75% offer, or the bin workers now and recently in dispute in...