Tag Archives: strike

LETTERS

Dear subtext,

This week our VC wrote to tell us that Lancaster would have supported the ACAS deal. But it is also true Lancaster would have supported the original UUK/USS proposal (perhaps reluctantly) which amounted to little less than criminal theft of our pensions.

This week our VC also wrote thanking those staff who have carried on working through the strike. I would also like to thank the strikers for having the courage to stand up for what is right. They are making sacrifices in order to protect the common good. They are striking because they care about Lancaster University, its students and the quality of education. Throughout the strike we have carried on teaching and learning at events in the city; this has not stopped. And any gains we make against the theft of our pension will benefit every USS member, not just those who are taking action.

The ACAS deal this week appeared at first sight to some to claw back some of what was being stolen from us. They would steal a little less. But we would pay a heavy price for that and end up all the weaker. It was firmly rejected because it too would signal the end of what we still have now – a mutualised scheme. And that is also why strikers are standing out there on the picket line every morning – because they don’t want to work in a glossy private corporation, they want to work in a university where education is seen as a public good for mutual benefit.

UUK’s position and governance processes are now exposed as a sham and are discredited. University leaders, students and even the financial press are calling for a rethink of the whole process and valuation methods. It seems no one can publicly defend the unethical practices which led up to the UUK’s decision to insist on ending defined benefits. An official complaint has been made about USS governance to the Charity Commission and there is now a crowdfunding initiative to sue the USS trustees. But we can’t give away our pension while the rethink takes place. Everyone will then lose.

So if you are a member of USS and you haven’t yet joined the action, join us for a warm welcome, and you can join UCU immediately. This will shorten the dispute and help us all do what we want – get back to work.

Maggie Mort

Sociology

***

Dear subtext,

Apropos Bob Jessop’s ‘seven crane vice chancellors’ (subtext 174), some time in the 1990s I paid my annual external examiner’s visit to an MA exam board at an institution on the outskirts of Greater London – naming no names. The course – innovative, if not radical, and with a terrific track record in attracting and supporting non-traditional students – had been in the university’s sights for some time, partly for just those reasons but also because several of the staff had had the cheek to object to various managerial ploys. I arrived just after the startled chair of the board had received a phone call from the Vice Chancellor’s office, to say that the VC was planning to turn up in a few minutes, to exercise his statutory right to attend any exam board in the university (not one of his regular habits). We decided that this must be intended to intimidate me, since the internal examiners were well beyond intimidation. A kindly staff member said to me ‘I find it helps if you remember that all VCs are property spivs. Some are developers, some are speculators. Ours is a speculator. What’s yours?’ Since this was in the days of the blessed Bill Ritchie, I was slightly at a loss to answer, but I found the advice helpful, and persisted in writing a glowing report despite the menacing charm with which the speculator took me aside after the meeting and invited me to ‘tell the truth’.

Oliver Fulton

***

Dear subtext,

Thank you for the review of the Dave Spikey show at the Grand Theatre, I am pleased that you liked it. As the volunteer Stage Manager I feel I can answer the question that you pose. The Grand Theatre presents shows which aim to attract audiences from all walks of life. As a charity funded largely by ticket sales we aim to complement the subsidised Dukes Theatre in our programming and attract as wide an audience as possible. Therefore the audience that you were part of merely reflects the followers of the act in question.

Regards,

James Smith

Facilities

***

Dear subtext

In the last edition of subtext your cultural correspondent in his review of the Dave Spikey show at the Grand invited readers to prove him wrong regarding his observation that he was the only member of the audience employed by the University. I was there on row C (that’s the second row for those unfamiliar with The Grand’s unusual seating plan) – a thorn between two retired/semi-retired colleagues. I’m sure there were others, although I will admit that I didn’t see any others from Uni, despite having plenty of time to look during the slexit (slow exit).

Clare Race

subtext 174 – ‘ambitious managed divergent subtext’

Fortnightly during term time.

Letters, contributions, & comments: subtext-editors@lancaster.ac.uk

Back issues & subscription details: http://wp.lancs.ac.uk/subtext/about/

In this issue: editorial, senate stuff, gary’s barmy army, bunker blues, fashion notes, pickets’r’us, sorry scan, court in the act, lusu democracy, lost and found, more lusu democracy, more lost and found, unis for sale, shart, comedy review, widden reviews, letters.

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EDITORIAL

Five days down, nine days of strike action to go (unless one side blinks today or tomorrow). It’s time for our Vice-Chancellor to state a consistent position, publicly, on the future of USS.

As subtext revealed in a newsflash last week, Prof Smith denied in Senate that – as reported in the Times that day – he’d broken ranks with the majority of Vice-Chancellors and supported a change to Universities UK’s current policy on USS. Apparently the sides are too far apart and we couldn’t afford UCU’s demands anyway.

Meanwhile, Prof Smith’s statements to staff meetings over the past few months have been broadly supportive of retaining a defined benefit scheme, and many staff had been heartened to read that ‘Mark’s on our side’ last Wednesday. Some may have decided at the last minute not to take strike action, in the belief that Prof Smith was one of the good guys and gals within UUK who deserved support.

So was the Times’s story just fake news? Or has our Vice-Chancellor been giving different messages to different audiences?

A string of Vice-Chancellors made public declarations of support for a change to Universities UK’s pensions policy in the last week, with one (Glasgow Principal Anton Muscatelli) even joining striking staff on the picket line . Now might be a good time for Prof Smith to side with the staff at his own institution …

… or not, if his statement to the Senate is a truer reflection of his thinking. If so, then he should say this openly – at least we’d know where he really stands.

SENATE SKETCHES

PLUNDERING THE PENSION

The VC opened his report with some good news. Applications are up, including a 9% increase from EU countries, while the sector average is down. Research grant income continues to be strong. Work has at last started on the new £41M Health Innovation Campus. Now for the not-so-good news. The level of university fees was now being questioned by the government (yes, that same government that increased them to over £9K in the first place). This was not good for universities, and while students might raise the odd cheer, the VC was scathing, especially about Lord Adonis’ suggestion that fees be pegged at £6K.

The big issue was the pensions dispute. The VC gave a succinct account of the recent history of USS pensions, showing how the various changes over the last few years had steadily reduced their value. There was a dispute about the size of the scheme’s current ‘deficit’ but he had thought that an agreement was close until the intervention of the Pensions Regulator. This, he believed, was political. The Regulator had been publicly lacerated over its laxity in the BHS and Capita pensions scandals and needed to show that it was on the case with USS. (Of course, an alternative interpretation might be that, as with Carillion, the Regulator was only too willing to support the employers’ interest). So this was how we got to where we are now.

At this point Senators might be forgiven if they thought that the VC was about to announce that he would be joining the picket lines himself the next day. Alas, this was not to be the case. When asked if he would be supporting LUSU’s and other Vice-Chancellors’ calls for an immediate return to national negotiations, he said emphatically that he would not. He denied the report in that day’s Times that he had joined ten other VCs in calling for a resumption of negotiations. The two sides were too far apart – he used the word ‘chasm’ – and as such there would be nothing to negotiate about. Besides, Lancaster could not afford the UCU demand for a 2% increase in the employer contribution to the pension fund. It would cut into our annual surplus, and everyone knows that our surplus is for Spine embellishments, football universities, and golf courses, not for frittering away on staff. Was there any chance of students’ getting any compensation for lost contact time, as is their right as consumers? Hardly! What about the strikers’ pay deductions? Would the money the university saved be donated to the student hardship funds, as had happened with previous strikes? Yes, of course, but only after certain university expenses had been covered. And what were these? Why, the cost of providing pensions advice to staff who would have to grapple with the complexities of a new defined contributions scheme. You can’t say that our VC doesn’t think ahead.

***

ALL POWER TO THE COUNCIL!

The big agenda item for the day was a raft of constitutional changes for Senate to approve. The Chief Administrative Officer opened by stating that the proposed changes followed from the recent Council Effectiveness Review and the abolition of Court, and it was largely a tidying up operation. She would not go through these in detail as she presumed that everyone had read the papers. It soon became clear that most Senators had not read the papers. Some had, though, and the claim enshrined in the proposals that Council was ‘the supreme governing body and final decision-maker’ was challenged. According to the CAO, this was required by the Code of Practice that all university governing bodies had to observe. Not so, said some Senators, with one reading aloud what the Code actually stated. To which the CAO responded with an irrefutable alternative fact – that this is what the new Office for Students might in the future require us to do. Senate seemed happy to accept this line of reasoning. One Senator seemed particularly troubled by the proposal to give Council the sole authority to make and amend Statutes and Ordinances, ‘Henry the Eighth powers’, as he called them. Against this the VC deployed his ultimate debating weapon – the Warwick Clincher. His old employer had done this, therefore so should Lancaster. Senate duly voted in favour. However, there was by now enough disquiet about the future position of Senate in terms of academic governance that the rest of the proposed changes were withdrawn for further working. But the VC had achieved what he wanted – Council now had the sole right to make, change and remove Statutes. Lancaster can now look forward to having a much smaller Senate – just like they have at Warwick, where they don’t have colleges.

***

BEST OF THE REST

The Dean of LUMS presented the formal proposal to close the Department of Leadership and Management, and split its activities between the departments of Organisation, Work and Technology, and Entrepreneurship, Strategy and Innovation. It would seem that the process to bring this about was a model of best practice, with a ‘consultative approach’ throughout ‘the project’, ‘clear communication given to staff’, and ‘consistent’ involvement with the unions. For what really happened, see subtext 169.

A proposal from the PVC (Education) for the establishment of an ‘Institute for the Enhancement of Learning and Teaching’ (InELT) was warmly received, its safe passage ensured by the promise that it wasn’t going to cost any money. However, it was felt that the acronym was insufficiently cumbersome for a Lancaster University institute so it was agreed that ‘curriculum’ should be inserted somewhere in its title. Perhaps it could be called something like ‘CELT’. Now that name rings a bell…

Finally, a paper from PPR and the Deputy VC for the establishment of an ‘Interdisciplinary Research Centre focused on China’. Now this one would cost money, so the paper was a testing of the waters rather than a definite proposal. Senate rather liked the idea, and agreed that the sponsors should go ahead with putting together a more detailed proposal.

TALES FROM THE PICKET LINES (AND BEYOND)

PICKET’S GOT TALENT

Picture it: The angry mob of workers, wearing dirty hi-vis jackets, furiously clutching placards as, with red faces and protruding eyes, they scream ‘SCAB!’ at passing colleagues who dare to go into work. Now picture the exact opposite, and you might have some idea of how Lancaster UCU does pickets. All picket locations were well attended, but the focus of activities was undoubtedly the main drive, which saw dozens of colleagues and students from across the University on each strike day, even edging up over 100 some days.

Beginning with the event on the eve of the strike last Wednesday, a beer-fuelled banner-making session in Lancaster’s newest real ale pub, 75 Church Street, creativity and high spirits have characterised Lancaster’s approach to picketing. Banners included the expected slogans (‘Campus closed’, ‘Staff and students unite’, ‘Support our staff’, ‘Don’t axe our pensions’), along with some more… creative offerings (‘UUK: Putting the “n” in “cuts”’ raised a few eyebrows). What particularly stood out was the crafty design of the banners – the banner-making session involved lots of cutting, sticking and sewing, and even ornate calligraphy, going well beyond the usual hastily scrawled bedsheets seen at most picket lines.

Once the strike started in earnest, things got even more creative, with members showing their talents at baking, music, dancing, and even sculpture: highlights included a scratch band that worked through a repertoire of Billy Bragg and Pete Seeger songs, a picket Zumba class that had everyone jumping around, and, on the last day, snow sculptures (a mini-picket line featuring its own banners, such as ‘UUK: Cold as ice’, which caused one observer to comment ‘but not willing to sacrifice’).

Alongside the picketing, UCU also organised a ‘Teach Out’, featuring a programme of talks and workshops, mainly at the Gregson, which allowed discussion and reflection of the strike and the wider causes of the strike (see also our review of Bob Jessop’s talk, below).

Despite the all-singing and dancing picket lines, the fun did not detract from the seriousness of the pensions dispute, and UCU reports that it continues to gain new members each day of the strike.

***

ESSENTIAL READING FOR THE PICKET LINE

subtext is pleased to announce a vibrant, up-to-the minute competitor publication has started up on campus. The Lancaster UCU’s daily strike update has been a simple, single-side-of-A4 publication, but it has quickly become essential reading – as well as ensuring that those crossing the picket line can’t just say ‘I’ve already got your leaflet!’ and drive on. Well done to all concerned.

***

SAMBA UP THE TOWN HALL STEPS

Following the last of the UCU ‘teach out’ sessions held at the Gregson on Wednesday (28th February) a spontaneous (well, almost) unauthorised march took place through the city centre towards the town hall. Forty or so ‘raggle-taggle’ folk trotted, skipped and samba-ed their way accompanied by drums, maracas, bits of wood that made noises, washboards, whistles and squeaky toys. They tramped through the streets to congregate on the town hall steps for an impromptu rally. They were joined by members of the National Education Union (formally the NUT) and a smattering of other trade union members, and quite a large number of students who supported the strike – so not quite as unplanned as was made out! Cue lots of speeches, calls-to-arms and witty chants, accompanied by a surprising number of motorists blasting their horns in support. However, it was jolly cold and after participants had fun photographing their fellow frozen demonstrators it was felt that they had made their presence known (before the police had got to twig what was going on). Banners were packed way and folk hurried home to a hot cup of something. Grand turn out for a (sort of) spur-of-the-moment event, but for folk to stand around in the bitter cold for so long says quite a lot – although exactly what is open to debate!

LU TEXT LOST AND FOUND

Those who follow us on Facebook (facebook.com/LUSubtext – you really should ‘like us’, we occasionally update the page and everything!) will have seen our latest takedown of the fake news media.

This time the culprit was the Times, which had the temerity to suggest that our Vice-Chancellor would be so fiscally reckless as to support further negotiations between UCU and UUK. As we noted on Facebook, the VC vehemently denied these claims at a subsequent meeting of the Senate, deeming UCU’s demands too expensive for the university to afford. But coverage is coverage, and if LU Text isn’t going to acknowledge Lancaster’s contribution to the public discourse, then subtext will: tinyurl.com/y98gbsey

ANOTHER LU TEXT LOST AND FOUND

From the top table to the student body, everyone is working hard to get the Lancaster brand out there. Yesterday, the Lancaster Guardian ran a story on the student body’s mobilisation in support of the strikes. Yes, in lieu of a stance/spine from the Students’ Union, students have independently organised an impressive campaign of support – they have set up a Facebook page (tinyurl.com/y9ldrpea), and so far nearly 700 students have signed an open letter to the VC in support of staff (tinyurl.com/yaqramg8). This is highly impressive work for an ad hoc group of students (imagine how much more support the campaign would have if the pathetic Students’ Union had taken a meaningful stance), and that LU Text hasn’t mentioned this coverage of enterprising Lancaster students is a mystery to us(!): tinyurl.com/y882w22y.

UNIVERSITIES INC.

As part of the series of UCU Teachout sessions being run during the strike period, Distinguished Professor Bob Jessop delivered a talk, ‘Universities Inc’, to a packed out audience at the Gregson Centre. The talk explored what Prof Jessop termed ‘academic capitalism’ and its relationship to an increased financialisation of the UK Higher Education system, and situated the ongoing pensions dispute in a wider context of structural economic changes taking place within universities.

Prof Jessop considered the core historic functions of the university as an institution, namely the provision of higher education and the carrying out of scientific research, and HE’s shifting in line with the forces of marketisation. Whereas in the post-war era of welfare statism and mass production HE institutions such as Lancaster University were designed to create ‘mental labour’ for an increasingly post-industrial society, Prof Jessop explained how today’s universities are behaving more like financial institutions. Since the 1980s, democratic participation in university governance have been sidelined in favour of professionalised management, he argued, adding that since the early 1990s senior academics were asked to attend business management style sessions. Such professionalisation of university management has, he argued, only worsened over subsequent decades.

Jessop highlighted how the diminution of government grants has lead to an increasing reliance upon endowments, greater numbers of fee paying students, bonds, credit markets, and rents to fund themselves. Indeed, having issued first bond in British HE in 1995, Lancaster University can be seen as having been a pioneer in such financial marketisation.

Drawing attention to the expansion of campuses in recent decades, Jessop highlighted how it is real estate (rather than the intellectual labour of staff) that has proven to be the key asset of the contemporary university, recalling a former Lancaster Vice Chancellor telling him that when talking to other managers he would boast of being ‘a seven crane vice chancellor,’ clearly demonstrating how the building up of physical assets on campuses has become so central to UK HE as a source of economic value and revenue.

The talk showed how in such a marketised environment, one only worsened by the new Higher Education Act and the uncertainties of Brexit, British universities are now fearing credit rating downgrades, and are seeking to drastically reduce their labour costs as a result.

From the talk, a bleak picture of contemporary UK HE emerged. As institutions embrace the process of financialisation precarious staff face further immiseration, with students treated primarily as a revenue stream.

In the subsequent Q&A session, the pensions strike itself was viewed by several contributors as having opened up an opportunity for more critical engagements with the university and the ills it inflicts upon staff and students alike. The question of how to reach the wider public and inform them of the dire situation in HE was also raised, with a contributor criticising a recent Channel 4 Dispatches programme for narrowly focusing on the extravagance of individual Vice Chancellors as opposed to offering the public a more structural critique of the processes of marketisation.

I found Prof Jessop’s talk an illuminating one for highlighting the complex challenges facing those of us within the marketised university, and for all the bleakness of the situation, I found that the subsequent discussion of how to resist these processes filled me with hope that we can build a more democratic and just HE system.

Contributed by Toby Atkinson, PhD candidate (Sociology)

SHART ATTACK

DRAFT
FROM: Mike M. Shart, VC, Lune Valley Enterprise University (LuVE-U).
TO: Rosemary Thyme, Education Editor, The Times.

SUBJECT: Your article.

Dear Rosemary,

I am writing to you regarding the coverage in an article you wrote for the Times. In particular, you name me, the Vice-Chancellor of LuVE-U, as one of 11 VCs calling for USSUK to ‘get back around the table with UCUnison.’ I appreciate how the email from my former Director of Publicity / Positivity Amalgamation, Hewlett Venkklinne, might have lead you to your suggestion that I support further discussions between the parties, but I hasten to add that Venkklinne is a disgruntled former employee, who was merely trying to disrupt my leadership by suggesting that I am weak. For example, I never demanded ‘fresh talks’ with lecturers. Needless to say, I did demand this, because Hewlett would only write something I told him to write. But what I actually want is fresh talks in which USSUK reiterates its unwillingness to bow to the demands of the UCUnison, since UCUnison clearly didn’t hear us the first time. Furthermore, you suggest that I have called for negotiators to get ‘back round the table.’ And you’re right, I do. I want negotiators to get back round the table with their students, so that they can continue to teach them like I’m paying them to do.

I haven’t read the rest of the article because it’s behind a paywall, but I can assure you that whatever Hewlett says to you is untrue because he no longer works here, and as such you should ignore it.

Best,
MMS.

***

FROM: Mike M. Shart, VC, Lune Valley Enterprise University (LuVE-U)
TO: Hewlett.Venkklinne123@blueyonder.co.uk
SUBJECT: FWD Your article.

Hewlett,

Could you let me know if the above is alright to send to the Times, please? Thanks.

LETTERS

Dear subtext,

Mr. Fleming’s letter (subtext 173) is factually inaccurate, and shows complete disregard for the strength of staff feeling on this issue at his alma mater, which had the highest turnout in the ballot in England and third highest in the UK, with over 88% endorsing strike action. I would like to respond to each of the points made in the letter in turn.

1. UCU has a strong mandate for industrial action, given by its members through an average turnout of more than 58% across all 68 institutions that were balloted (a record), with 88% voting for strike action and 93% for action short of a strike. Membership is at record levels, with over a 100 members joining UCU at LU in the last two-three weeks alone. The only thing that seems to be over the top is UUK’s intransigence to negotiations, given a number of VCs across the sector, including institutions like Loughborough, Glasgow, Warwick, Birkbeck, Goldsmiths, Strathclyde, London School of Tropical Hygiene and Medicine and others are publicly calling for a resumption of national talks.

2. While previous pension arrangements are indeed protected, under proposed changes the future pension arrangements will not be protected from 2019. Proposed changes mean our pensions will move from the current defined benefit scheme (which guarantees the rate of pension received in retirement), to a defined contribution scheme (fixing the rate of pay contributing to pension). Crucially, when the chief executive of USS was asked when he visited Lancaster how USS would protect members from the vagaries of the financial markets and that put members pensions at considerable risk, no answer was forthcoming.

3. We are not working in the private sector – our pensions are just a small recompense for our very modest salaries. Modest in relation to the private sector, with very little movement between grades over the lifetime of work, and with the ‘initial investment’ of time and effort spent in gaining qualifications to work in a University that many in the private sector are not required to make. It seems disingenuous to make any comparisons with the private sector, and hardworking academic and related staff would find any comparisons with employer contributions to a pension scheme in the private sector particularly odious. Those who work in the education sector do so because they have a special set of values, of public good and not individual benefit. Our lifetime contributions to our pensions are being put at risk of markets, with it being left to the individuals to decide what they want to do with their pension pot upon retirement. Do we think vultures would be circling? We only have to see what has happened at British Steel recently.

4. UCU has proposed a range of models that illustrate how defined benefits can be maintained by modest increases in contributions (for e.g. 1% for the employees if employers decide to accept the September valuation), lowering of accrual from 1/75th to 1/80th, and willingness to negotiate on salary thresholds. UUK have rejected all proposals outright saying they will only accept a defined contribution scheme.

Sunil Banga

UCU Exec, Pensions Officer

***

Dear subtext,

I have been trying to understand the reasons for the current pensions dispute, and have found this talk by Carlo Morelli, an economics lecturer at Dundee University really useful:

Most interesting in the talk to me was that the changes appear likely to make the resulting scheme very unattractive to potential new members, causing the very shortfalls in money that Universities UK claim to want to prevent. Over time, USS could fall apart, and each University is legally required to act as guarantor to the current scheme. As I understand it, the danger is therefore not limited to staff pensions, but in the worst case could even affect each university, because each would be required to fund their ex-staff’s existing final salary defined pensions. I am left wondering whether Universities UK are doing a good job of representing the interest of UK universities.

Mike Cowie

***

Dear subtext,

I was disappointed to see, in your most recent mailout, the claim that SCAN’s UA92 debate column was ‘its first mention of the Gary Neville University since the story broke a year ago.’

This is incorrect. The debate column was published on October 23 2017. We first reported on the Gary Neville University in March 2017 (tinyurl.com/yaw4q7go). We published a second article on October 5 2017 [tinyurl.com/ydftypme].

A Google search for ‘SCAN Gary Neville’ would have produced these articles as the first two results. Alternatively, the SCAN editorial team are happy to search our archives if you need clarification of our coverage in future.

Best,

Michael Mander

SCAN Associate Editor

***

Dear subtext,

I would like to issue a complaint regarding your recent article entitled ‘Alt Wrong’. The article is blatantly libellous on numerous accounts, among which are your claims that we are somehow affiliated with the ‘alt right’, that we are ‘fascists’, ‘national socialists’, in favour of ‘pure blooded ancestry’, and further that we were ‘verbally aggressive towards colleagues’ leading us to be ‘ejected by security staff’. There are many other examples of these outright falsities, and the fact that subtext never reached out to our society for comment only reinforces the impression that you did not intend to fairly represent our society, only to defame it. We have numerous eye-witness accounts that can corroborate this.

While you may argue that the article never mentions our society by name, you made explicit reference to us, such that the article incited opposition to the society which may have escalated to violence were it not for the measures put in place by the University. The University felt the need to hire security and have a member of the police present to ensure that peace was kept, which demonstrates the threat that arose directly from the misrepresentations present in your article. Given these threats, I would ask that my name is not posted on your site, due to the false perception of our society that exists both on and off campus.

Your newsletter claims to be one in favour of free speech ‘without fear of backlash’, yet here our impression is that you are presenting things that did not happen as fact, in order to manufacture backlash with the intent of de-platforming our society.

We request that you remove this inflammatory article and issue an apology, in the interests of preventing further undue backlash and promoting intellectual diversity on campus.

Name withheld on request.

[As the writer acknowledges, subtext did not name the organisation they claim to represent – Eds.]

PREVARICATION NEWSFLASH

On the eve of pensions strike, Lancaster UCU members were cheered by a report in that day’s Times that VC Mark Smith had joined ten other university leaders in calling for a return to national negotiations. This represented a fundamental change in his position but, alas, it proved to be fake news. A couple of hours later he was asked about his change of heart and he denied the story emphatically. He did not see any value in calling for a resumption of talks because the two sides were too far apart. And anyway, Lancaster could not afford what UCU was asking for.

See subtext 174, out next Thursday, 1st March, for a full report.

STUDENT CITIZENS’ ADVICE BUREAU?

‘To govern is to choose. To appear to be unable to choose is to appear to be unable to govern.’ So said a wise person… well, OK, actually it was Nigel Lawson. Still, it’s a good quote.

LUSU’s executive committee has decided against taking a position on the UCU strike. They report that, ‘Lancaster University Students’ Union sympathises with the position of the UCU and their members, but in the best interests of our students we do not wish to see this action go ahead and believe all sides of the debate have a part to play in reducing the impact on our members’ education. It was decided that we as your students’ union would take the position of supportive communication, in that we will endeavour to provide impartial information pertaining to both sides of the dispute, making sure that each of you are supported, empowered and informed enough to take your own stance on this matter. We understand that this is a big issue and there will be students on either side of the argument, therefore our priority is reducing the impact on your academia.’

They’ve been as good as their word. What should students do? Well, LUSU has produced two infographics. ‘If you support UCU strike action…’ then you can lobby the VC and ask your lecturers how you can support them. But ‘If you don’t support UCU strike action…’ then you can lobby the VC and encourage academic support from your lecturers. That’ll tell them.

Some readers may feel relieved that, at least, LUSU hasn’t come out against the UCU and NUS position on the strike. But, others will argue, the duty of a students’ union is to take a decision and fight hard for it. Are students really getting ‘value for money’ when their union behaves more like the Citizens’ Advice Bureau than a representative body?

Two years ago LUSU abolished most of its democratic decision-making processes, removing Union Council and replacing it with a labyrinthine system of ‘student juries’ and referendums, to be called upon to reach a consensus – slowly – whenever the executive proposed doing anything contentious. Non-resolutions like the current position on strike action are, as we predicted, the result.

STUDENT ACTIVISM SHOWS SOME SIGNS OF LIFE

subtext counted 66 people at Lancaster UCU’s ‘Everything students need to know about the strike’ meeting on Tuesday 13 February in the Faraday Lecture Theatre, which was either disappointingly low or surprisingly high, depending on your expectations. The lead presenter, Dr Jacob Phelps, started off by stressing how dull pensions were, and followed this with a lively 15-minute presentation on the subject. Particularly entertaining was Dr Phelps’s spine-chilling story of ‘the covenant’ – the shadowy conspiracy that plots to destroy our retirements. No, not really. According to the Pensions Regulator it means ‘the employer’s legal obligation and financial ability to support their defined benefit scheme now and in the future.’

Dr Phelps closed by stressing that ‘a university that doesn’t care long-term for its staff doesn’t care for its students,’ and listing three things which students could do: help get others informed; use your powerful voice; and get involved.

Questions followed, and everything was all very polite, until LUSU was mentioned, at which point there were literal shrieks of derision from several of the students present: ‘They’re not trying! They took a stance to not take a stance!’ Many of the UCU members present were happy to share their memories of the days when students’ unions used to behave, well, like students’ unions: ‘They used to organise! That is the point of a students’ union.’

As far as your subtext correspondent could see, none of the LUSU sabbaticals turned up.

STRIKE!

The dates have been announced, and it’s the biggest strike in UCU history. Fourteen days of action in four consecutive weeks, taking place at Lancaster and 60 other universities: Thursday to Friday in Week 16, Monday to Wednesday in Week 17, Monday to Thursday in Week 18 and Monday to Friday in Week 19. Many courses will be disrupted; for modules set to run in Weeks 16-20 where teaching staff are taking action, it is difficult to see how the course can continue at all.

Our VC has subtly changed his position in recent weeks. Whereas before Christmas the message from D Floor was one of cautious sympathy, the line now seems to be ‘nothing I can do about it, mate!’ Reportedly (see our Court report below) the larger, older universities are not going to tolerate having larger pension liabilities appearing on their balance sheets, for fear this might affect their ability to raise funds.

Despite these supportive noises from management, Lancaster UCU members voted overwhelmingly to strike, on a turnout that was the third highest in the UK, and the highest in England.

Lancaster UCU has stressed its wish to ensure that no-one is prevented from taking action due to financial hardship, and has re-established its local strike fund, but the prospect of losing 14 days’ pay is likely to lead to difficult decisions for many staff.

subtext readers on grades 6 and above who are not presently members of UCU can join at any point and take strike action – recruitment is reportedly very healthy. HR has actually informed HoDs that UCU membership has ‘significantly increased since the strike was called’. Interesting that such a call for action has resulted in such a significant increase in membership, and somewhat curious that HR felt the need to tell HoDs.

Nobody at present thinks this one is going to be resolved any time soon.

HODS ORDERED TO TOE THE LINE

Department and section heads have been pondering the implications of an email sent to them on 24 January by the Director of HR, using the stentorian address ‘Industrial Action’, informing them that ‘there will be actions required of you as Heads of Department/Section to support in the preparation and management of the industrial action.’ Fair enough. But, the memo continues, ‘the 2016 Head of Department Review reaffirmed that leadership during industrial action is a requirement of the Head of Department role, alongside other leadership roles. As such, we will require academic HoDs who are intending to exercise their right (given they have an underpinning academic contract) to participate in industrial action to alert us in advance. We will be asking any participating HoDs to temporarily stand down for the purposes of managing industrial action and potentially other duties and agree with us a replacement HoD.’ It’s unclear whether this requirement is intended to apply to section heads also.

Readers will probably be aware that one of the main protections union members have when they go on strike is that they are under no obligation to inform anyone of this in advance – and these protections also apply to HoDs, surely? The implied threat is that HoDs – and maybe section heads also – who fail to abide by this communiqué may find themselves removed from office. Over to you, lawyers…

subtext 170 – ‘A frontier without borders, a subtext without regulatory alignment’

Fortnightly during term time.

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In this issue: editorial, the vc’s pay, deliverology, plug, court, qa at ua, plenty of pvcs, signs, more signs, damp, lost and found, spirit of 84, end of term message, shart, mark thomas review, letters

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EDITORIAL

UCU members have received ballot papers to vote on proposals for strike action to defend USS pensions. We have been here before (see, for example, subtext 82). What makes this one any different? Well, aside from the refrain of ‘won’t get fooled again’ which should be ringing in the ears of everyone as they cast their votes, this is the first strike ballot called by UCU since the Trade Union Act 2016 came into force. The ballot will not be valid unless 50% of the UCU membership participates.

Consider the likely consequences if the 50% threshold is not met. ‘If they can’t get half their membership to vote on an issue like their own pensions,’ the country’s VCs will think, ‘can they get half their membership to vote on anything at all?’ Probably not. Slightly perversely, this means that a vote for ‘No’ on a high turnout would do more for the future bargaining strength of our unions than an overwhelming vote for ‘Yes’ on a turnout of 49%.

So it is all about the turnout and subtext urges all its readers in the UCU to attend one the UCU’s pension information meetings and then cast their vote – we hope you’ll vote ‘Yes’, but would prefer that you voted ‘No’ rather than not voting at all.