¹û¶³Ó°Ôº

At the meeting we will elect representatives for two Branch Delegate Meetings (one on USS and one on Four Fights) on the morning of Tuesday 18 January. If you are interested in attending as a delegate from the branch, please email ucu@ucl.ac.uk.

These meetings will feed into a later meeting of the UCU Higher Education Committee, which will make decisions about the next steps for the campaigns including calling strike action.

We have received a motion for debate, see Appendix 1 below.

Members are invited to submit amendments to ucu@ucl.ac.uk by Monday at 10am for circulation in the morning and consideration in the meeting.

¹û¶³Ó°Ôº UCU Executive Committee

@ucl_ucu

¹û¶³Ó°Ôº UCU

Ìý

Appendix 1 - motion for debate

Four Fights and USS Future Industrial Action

¹û¶³Ó°Ôº UCU notes:

1. Up to 100 branches could have a mandate for industrial action when results are announced.
2. The twin disputes strategy is successfully mobilising members across HE for both strike action and Action Short of Strike (ASOS). In addition, UCU is again seeing a new surge in membership indicating growing support for our demands among ever wider layers of HE staff.
3. Despite the high levels of support for industrial action, including similar proportionate votes for action in branches that missed the anti-union threshold, and three days of action in Term 1, employers in HE have failed to seriously engage in the issues at the heart of the two disputes.
4. HE institutions have record levels of income but continue to pursue maximising surpluses over student or staff wellbeing and educational quality. At the same time student debt is growing at ~£18bn a year, reaching £160bn by the end of the 2020-21 academic year.

¹û¶³Ó°Ôº UCU believes:

1. The cost-of-living crisis raises the importance of the Four Fights dispute, and our dispute therefore has new relevance for other trade unions and workers.
2. The 28th of February deadline for confirmation of the benefit cuts and cost increases in USS makes for urgency in calling industrial action.
3. Employers are prepared to wait out action which is time limited.
4. Strike action combined with ASOS provide the union with maximum leverage on employers while limiting the extent to which employers can place pressure on members to reschedule or replace lost work.
5. Our disputes are not due to underfunding in the sector but the misuse of the funding in the sector. Marketisation, student debt and privatisation and their impact on staff and students highlight the broken nature of the variety of marketised models of HE operating across the whole of the UK.

¹û¶³Ó°Ôº UCU calls:

1. For future action to be escalating and indefinite in its form, involving escalating strike action for three weeks prior to the 28th of February deadline in USS and continuing with indefinite action from the 28th of February deadline. The Four Fights dispute should follow the same timetable.
2. For all forms of ASOS, including a marking and assessment boycott, to be considered and included in the action timetable, and for preparations for a reballot of branches, where necessary, to allow action to be continued into the exam and graduation period.
3. For establishing compulsory levies in non-striking branches to sustain action in the striking branches and for an appeal to the trade union movement to show solidarity by donating to the UCU strike fund.
4. On branches to organise local/city wide staff student and community assemblies to build support for the defence of our living standards and pensions across the wider trade union movement.
5. On branches to support, publicise and send delegates to the UCU Solidarity Movement Conference on 29th January