UCU members consultation says no to pay offer, yes to joint work on conditions
Michael Salmon is News Editor at Wonkhe
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UCU’s consultative ballot to its members over the 2024–25 pay and conditions negotiations closed on Tuesday 3 December, and the results have followed the union’s recommendations to members back in October.
Some 68 per cent of those voting in the poll recommended rejecting the pay offer – but 86 per cent were in favour of accepting the non-pay elements (work with UCEA on contract types, pay spine review, workload, and equality pay gaps) that had come out of the New JNCHES discussions.
UCEA chief executive Raj Jethwa has written to UCU:
You will recall UCEA’s position, as set out in our proposal of 20 September 2024, is that we would not want the rejection of the pay uplift to inhibit our ability as employers and trade unions to make progress in the important areas identified in the Terms of Reference (ToRs) or any of the other matters included in our Full and Final offer. Therefore, if the unions do not pursue a ballot for industrial action, the employers will note that the unions have not accepted the pay uplift and will work with the unions to progress the other elements of our offer.
I note that the outcome of the consultative ballot reflects the position anticipated in our September proposal, and indeed the recommendations of UCU’s Higher Education Committee. Your members have signalled rejection of the pay offer, but confirmed strong support for joint work as set out in our Full and Final offer.
On a turnout of 27 per cent, those voting were almost evenly split on whether they would be in favour of pursuing industrial action in pursuit of an improved offer (53 per cent yes, 47 per cent no) – it now falls to the union’s higher education committee to decide on next steps, which could involve a proper industrial action ballot, which as per the above statement would throw into question the non-pay elements.
Of the other sector trade unions, Unison had already consulted its members over the summer, and has recently said that it will open an industrial action ballot over the 2024–25 offer on 21 January 2025, running until 4 March 2025. For the others (Unite, GMB, EIS-ULA) there has been little in the way of news about next steps since we rounded them up here.
Updated Friday 6 December:
UCEA has sent us a statement, reproduced below.
The consultative ballot results show that UCU’s members have followed the recommendations of the UCU’s Higher Education Committee (HEC) and voted to reject the pay uplift by 68% and to accept the Terms of Reference (ToRs) for joint work by 86%. It is disappointing that of those who did vote, 53% voted that they would be willing to take industrial action. UCU members, UCEA and the other trade unions now wait to see what the HEC’s next steps will be.
With the sector already facing unprecedented challenges and given the low turnout, we hope that the HEC does not call for a ballot for industrial action to take place. UCEA has committed to work with the unions to progress the joint work agreed as part of the full and final 2024-25 pay offer. These New JNCHES priorities include a joint review of the pay spine and joint work on contract types, workload and equality pay gaps.
Given the overwhelming support among UCU members for joint work with employers, together with the ambivalent response to industrial action and the stretched financial position of the sector, we urge UCU’s HEC to grasp the opportunity to work with UCEA on our important joint priorities.
I am pleased to see acceptance of ceasing ia on the other 3 fights here – a rare moment of being sensible from this mostly basket case union. From what I can tell, these terms are basically to keep negotiating and little more, but even that is a huge step forward in grown-up negotiation – and had the negotiators not been so ludicrously attached to rejecting everything on this in 2020 and since, there might have been a chance of a better pay settlement in, say, 2022.
But that wasn’t to be, and now the uni sector is the opposite of “awash with cash” (it was never that anyway, but never mind) and there is only 27% turnout on this ballot with only 53% in favour of strike action – or in other words, 1/7 of the union membership is prepared to go on strike over pay. Or maybe “lobby government”, let’s see how that goes eh.
It’s not uniquely Jo Grady’s fault that UCU have ended up here – where a cynic would say, 3 issues have been abandoned for IA and the other, pay, is basically dead – but she does shoulder a lot of blame over it I think, for dragging the union in an IA-happy direction and basically misleading members over both the state of UK HE.
I mean, as I’ve said before on here, in addition to “awash with cash” we’ve also had ridiculously misleading accounts of PhD students “forced” to live in tents cos of low pay/insecurity when it was painfully obvious that they were incredibly unusual situations and the results of ill advised decisions which for the most part uni’s could do little about other than pay PhD students £400 an hour for teaching; we’ve had ridiculously skewed “research” on workloads which for the most part people in other industries would bite your arm off for and which a “win” on would have seen uni’s monitoring work activities by the hour; and campaigns about “ending casualisation” which have suggested such ridiculous solutions as to seem written by people who believe there is infinite money in the sector. And as for pay gaps, we’ve had everything from uni’s rejected for basically no reason.
Kudos to the amazing leader who cosplayed as a radical to get in! I bet the loyal members who have lost months of pay over this are really happy.
However, that doesn’t help the academics at the University of Bolton, whose VC and cowardly board of governors have proposed that the UCEA pay offer be deferred for 11 months due to exceptional financial circumstances, i.e. the assumed £70 million in the bank. This figure cannot be verified since the institution will not release the relevant financial documents.
The 23/24 financial statements, externally audited, have to be made public though, and soon (if not already done). That will show the position at July, although it doesn’t predict what cash is then needed for what
It’s arguably a good time for industrial action, even if the numbers participating aren’t massive. It would be the first high profile strike of the Starmer government, at a time when they are in a sensitive spot politically. There needs to be a settlement for the sector and the govt need to get on with it. A strike is a sign that this settlement needs to put institutions in a position to make a reasonable pay offer.