UCU staff fail to reach threshold as ballot action fails
By James Cleaver, Online News Editor
41 per cent of UCU (University and College Union) staff responded to the ballot, below the 50 per cent required to legitimise ballot action.
While the figures for the University of Bristol will not be released due to the ballot being aggregated, only 28,295 staff nationwide responded out of a potential 69,084 responders.
Earlier this year Epigram reported on the 70,000 UCU staff in higher education being balloted on whether they supported strike action or action short of strike action, which could have included a marking and assessment boycott. The ballot reflected concerns over staff pay, the gender pay gap, excessive workloads and insecure contracts.
In response to the first question, asking whether respondents would be prepared to take industrial strike action, close to 70 per cent of respondents voted ‘Yes’. An even greater percentage, over 80 per cent, stated their willingness to take ‘industrial action consisting of action short of strike action up to and including marking and assessment boycott’.
This is the second time UCU staff have failed to reach the 50 per cent threshold after rejecting the pay offer from the Universities and Colleges Employers’ Association (UCEA) in June of last year.
In an email to Bristol UCU members, Tracey Hooper, Bristol UCU President, claimed that ‘the vote in the ballot demonstrated a strength of feeling among members that cannot be easily dismissed.’ She went on to affirm the union’s priorities, which include tackling the gender pay gap and making academic roles more secure. A General Meeting will be held on 13 March to discuss how to achieve these objectives.
Out of Unison and Unite, the two other University of Bristol campus unions, only Unite achieved a sufficient turnout, 53 per cent, to legitimise strike action late last year. Secretary of the University of Bristol’s Unite branch Robert Massie has previously said that ‘we could not take any action unless other unions achieved a positive vote to take industrial action so we are waiting with interest to hear the UCU result.’
In February and March last year university staff across the country took part in strike action to protest against proposed changes to their pensions by Universities UK (UUK) through the Universities Superannuation Scheme by Universities UK.
Featured image: Epigram / Evy Tang