Newcastle University faces the greatest crisis in its history and management is doubling-down on a broken funding model. This relies on high capital spend, cross-subsidisation from international students, and overseas campuses, while staff experience damaging restructures, job losses, impacts on health and increasing workload.
This crisis affects every single member of staff: PS to academic, PGR to Prof, all three faculties. If your area was not mentioned on Thursday, you will be impacted in terms of workload, morale and stress. This is alongside the management expecting further job cuts, claiming a £50m shortfall next academic year, and an undoubtedly painful restructure of the faculties and ‘professional service realignment’.
Redundancies are a brutal process and profoundly difficult for all in scope. We have a lot of experience of supporting members through this. All of us need to show our solidarity to those facing the shock of seeing their discipline on UEB’s list. We appeal for additional reps particularly in those areas named, and will organise meetings for these sections to offer support, advice, and training. We will communicate the details shortly.
No wonder staff voted No Confidence in the VC and UEB by 90.7%.
Two meetings with management on Thursday 3 April
At 8.30am on Thursday, branch negotiators were asked to meet with management at very late notice, ostensibly as an update on the Voluntary Severance. There, management announced another round of voluntary severance identifying particular ‘areas’ for additional savings.
At this meeting (and at the three campus union consultation later in the day at 3pm), we pointed out that this effectively constituted pools for redundancy and that a statutory requirement exists to consult when pools, selection criteria and methodology are ‘in formation’. Management quibbled that the areas are not pools and that they will come to us with a proposal on methodology towards the end of April. We object to this and dispute this reading of the statutory obligations on the employers. We have asked for all documentation regarding this process between schools, HR and PVCs.
The negotiators believe the new extension of VS is double-edged. Positively, our industrial action has clearly made management reluctant about compulsory redundancies, so we should see this as a win. The threat of redundancy (section 188) was notified on 21 January, so dismissals could have occurred after 45 days — thanks to all of our efforts, this has not happened. Negatively, identifying areas increases pressure on colleagues, leading to very considerable anxiety and distress, particularly given management’s failure to publicly dispel the idea that plans were already in place for targeting redundancies.
We also asked for further insight in impact on the growing gender pay gap, and groups with other protected characteristics, and asked for this to be informing further VS decisions as well.
We reiterated our desire for UEB to avert further industrial action by abandoning compulsory redundancies and addressing workload, job security across contract types. Management stated they needed an additional £4.9m of staff savings and claimed a projected £50m shortfall next year so the likelihood of more cuts (which is a threat to us all, even those not in the ‘areas’ listed). We repeated our reading of the financial situation. No redundancy is necessary. The additional staff saving is 0.6% of turnover. Our cash position in July will be little different from last July. Senior salary above the 51-point pay spine could be reduced, or even just ‘not increased’ over the next few years, to find savings. Capital expenditure could be paused or reduced.
We again asked to present to Council, the university’s governing body. UEB’s formal position is that Council had approved their business case on 20 January and thus they are abiding by the university’s statutes. We also offered to have 1-2-1 meetings with Councillors. We stated our belief that Council need to exercise their sovereign duties to prevent a further disastrous next step of compulsory redundancies.
After the meeting, management’s plan for target areas and more VS was then cascaded to the entire university with additional information from Faculty PVCs. Once more, this communication failed to dispel the rumours about pools and criteria, despite them promising to do so several times.
After our branch meeting, at 3pm, we had a consultation on redundancies with three UEB members present. We had received further information with less than a day’s notice. For the first time in a while, the Chief Financial Officer Nick Collins was present, responding to the financial situation and the UCU’s employee-counter-proposal. The contents of this were summarised in last week’s communications, and a shareable version of this will be put on the website shortly. The counter-proposal demonstrates the options available to avoid dismissals. UEB have thus dismissed the reduction of senior management pay or the use of the ample cash reserves or reducing capital expenditure to prevent the dismissals. They continue to invest heavily in the Castle Leazes joint venture despite planning permission not yet granted.
Next steps in industrial action: Thursday 3 April Branch Meeting
Thank you to all who attended section meetings, the reps meeting, and Thursday’s branch meeting (194 attending at its height) to decide on next steps in our dispute. Undoubtedly, management’s announcement galvanised turnout and the strength of feeling at the Emergency General Meeting. We heard from the Vice-President of Durham University UCU about their ballot result and their willingness to coordinate strike days with us.
We then passed an enabling motion defining the industrial action after the spring break which the employer will be notified of. The base motion was written in conjunction with branch reps, and each resolution was voted on in parts. Each resolution of the motion passed by large majorities. This was an enabling motion due to the legal processes of notifying the employer within the Trade Union Act of 2016. The motion allows us to seek authorisation from the elected UK Officers of UCU without specifying dates of action. This allows us to flag to the employer our willingness to take serious action. We will be getting agreement from the elected HE Officers of UCU for the notification of action. The employer will be notified of dates with 14 days’ notice of action.
A Campaign of Lobbying and Press Work: What We Can All Do
Our industrial action has amplified other campaigning approaches. We very much encourage members to lobby their MPs, and particularly encourage members from the named ‘areas’ to do so. We have produced a Guide to Lobby Your MP for members to assist with the evidence-base of the arguments. Please report back how you get on. We have launched the Open Letter to Bridget Phillipson which should soon be circulated officially to all branches. We will continue to engage with the Students’ Union and student supporters. We meet the SU on Tuesday.
We are finalising the details of a regional demonstration over the cuts in Higher Education. There is a national demonstration on 10 May. Our general secretary is speaking at the Higher Education Commons Select Committee on Tuesday. The branch will be submitting an update on our position.
Our press campaign continues, as our webpage highlights. Here is the latest article from the Chronicle:
Resistance is spreading to other branches—Birmingham City, Kent, Liverpool, Sheffield, Sheffield International College, Edinburgh, Durham, Dundee, Cardiff, Bournemouth, UEA and Bradford Universities are either balloting, through a threshold, or seeking authorisation. It is worth also noting that there are motions to UCU national Congress on a national campaign against redundancies in Higher Education in May.
Solidarity for those under threat, an injury to one is an injury to all. Together we are strong. Let’s keep up the pressure on management. We need a wider campaign over HE funding.