Staff working conditions are your learning conditions: Support the Strike
Here at the Liverpool Guild of Students we are proud to be supporting striking staff in the UCU at the University of Liverpool. The University and College Union went on strike over pay, working conditions and pensions over three days in Semester One, they have now announced strike days for Semester Two, starting 1st Feb. If the action goes ahead, it will be the biggest series of strikes ever to hit UK university campuses.??
In our UCU Strike Information hub we will provide a background to the UCU dispute, a statement from the Student Officers and FAQs so you can understand why UCU are taking industrial action, what you can do to support it and why student staff solidary is so important.
What can you do to support the strike
The full strike dates are:
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Week 2 - Thursday 9 and Friday 10 February?
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Week 3 - Tuesday 14, Wednesday 15 and Thursday 16 February?
The University College Union announced on Friday 17th Feb that they are pausing strike action for the next two weeks due to “reaching a point in discussions with our employers where they have made?significant progress across a range of issues.” This means the strikes on Tuesday 21st, Wednesday 22nd and Thursday 23rd February next week, and Monday 27th and Tuesday 28th February and Wednesday 1st and Thursday 2nd March will not go ahead. All of the action scheduled after these dates remains in place.
UCU warned during Semester One strikes that disruption in Semester Two could be avoided if employers had acted fast and made improved offers. The UCU did not feel this happened, so strike action has escalated.
There is a chance that all or some of the strike days won’t go ahead if the negotiators reach an agreement on pensions, pay and working conditions with UCU.?
As well as the walkout, staff have a mandate to?take action?short of strike and will include strictly working to contract and refusing any additional duties. This is set to go on indefinitely for the?period?staff have a mandate?(this is six months from the date the ballot closed- 21st October 2022), or until a?resolution?is agreed between parties.???
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The industrial action referred to has been called by The University and College Union (UCU). They are a trade union that represent over 110,000 academics, lecturers, trainers, instructors, researchers, managers, administrators, computer staff, librarians and postgraduates in universities, colleges, prisons, adult education and training organisations across the UK.
There have been unsuccessful negotiation on pensions, pay and working conditions to try to reach an agreement with universities nationally.
USS (Universities Superannuation Scheme) is the pension scheme used by universities. A pension works by employers and employees paying money into an employees’ pot while they work which employees can then access when they retire. They can either be run in two ways:
- defined benefit in which the pay out each month at retirement is agreed on and employees receive that fixed value each month until they die (unlimited pension value depending on how long you live).
- The other is defined contribution in which the contributions to a pot are invested while the employee works and the proceeds make up the pension at retirement (fixed value of pension pot).
The USS has been running at a deficit for a few years which means it doesn’t have enough money to pay out to retirees. It made reforms in 2016 to run on a hybrid model of defined benefits up until employee salary threshold of £60k. Salaries above that become defined contribution schemes.
This resulted in strike action in 2017 which was inconclusive, and then a second wave of strikes in late 2019 and early 2020 (though the second wave expanded to include the ‘four fights’ outlined below). When the pandemic emerged the strikes/ dispute was called off. Another assessment in 2021 revealed that the USS were in even great deficit which needs to be filled with higher contributions or lower/reduced benefits – employees who are working will have to give more of their salary to the pension pot without an increase in pay out value at retirement or they will get a lower pay out when they retire.
The UCU say that under recent changes since 2011, a typical UCU member will pay around £40,000 more into their pension but receive almost £200,000 less in retirement because of the changes to USS. They say that this will leave them £240,000 worse off. UCU are calling for a stop to the changes outlined above, and for a new valuation of pension fund to be carried out.
UCU’s video on pensions dispute: https://youtu.be/pCShjYlfUjE
Impact on Teaching, Assessments and Campus Spaces
If you're a postgraduate student who teaches, we encourage you to join UCU for free. Supervisions are likely to be affected in the same way that lectures and seminars will be, so your sessions may not take place.
For those of you considering strike action the University has confirmed the following:
Graduate Teaching Assistants (GTA) cover a range of roles. If you have an hourly paid contract with the University, you will be treated as employees and so will have pay deducted in the appropriate manner.
If you are undertaking teaching or demonstrating duties as part of your studentship you are not an employee and are therefore not entitled to strike. However, the University recognises that you may not wish to cross a picket line in your role as GTA. As you are not employees of the University, no action will be taken against you. We would, however, encourage you to let your department know as soon as possible if you do not intend to undertake your duties during the industrial action so that departments can plan accordingly to minimise the impact on other students.
The University has confirmed that if a lecture is cancelled due to the strike action, this will not affect your visa. The University will continue to maintain sponsorship of all Tier 4 students whilst they are on their course.
However, if some of your lectures or tutorials are taking place during the strike, the University expect students to attend. If you choose not to cross the picket line and therefore do not attend lectures and/or tutorial on modules you are registered for, you will be recorded as absent in line with your School’s attendance policy on attendance.
For international students, the University’s existing policy on absences will still be in place and students will still be expected to attend. Visa status may be impacted if a student’s attendance falls below agreed levels.
Whilst we encourage students to consider not crossing the picket line, we understand that international students will need to attend lectures due to Tier 4 Visa requirements
Taking Action