The University of Greenwich has received official notification from the University and College Union (UCU) that they plan to take strike action as part of a national dispute on the pay award for 2021/22. UCU is one of five recognised trade unions representing university staff nationally, and one of four at the University of Greenwich.
Pay and conditions in universities are negotiated and agreed upon nationally and the University of Greenwich is represented by the Universities and Colleges Employers Association (UCEA), who negotiate on behalf of 146 universities and colleges. The University of Greenwich does not therefore negotiate directly on nationally negotiated pay.
What’s happened so far
UCEA began their national negotiations on the 2021/22 pay award in March 2021. As an agreement was not reached during these discussions, UCEA advised universities to make a pay award to ensure staff were not disadvantaged by the ongoing dispute.
Following this advice, the University of Greenwich implemented the pay award effective from 1 August 2021, with increases ranging from 1.5% up to 3.6%, with the larger percentage being paid to staff on lower salary spines. The university also took the decision to apply the increase to London Weighting and to hourly rates for HPL teachers and associated staff.
UCU have balloted their members nationally over pay and conditions, including those at Greenwich, which represents approximately 20% of our total staff. UCU members voted to take strike action and action short of a strike.
UCU also held a second ballot with members whose institutions offer their staff the USS pension scheme, with the result that a number of universities are taking strike action on this too. This second dispute does not apply to the University of Greenwich, as we offer academic colleagues access to the Teachers Pensions Scheme (TPS).
What we’ve been doing at the University of Greenwich
The University of Greenwich fully supports the work UCEA is doing nationally and their commitment to reach a resolution on the national dispute over pay and conditions.
In addition to the pay increases implemented, the university is continuing to work on improving the things that we know are important to our students and staff, including:
- Addressing casualisation, low pay and employment rights. We have recently reviewed the arrangements for our hourly paid lecturers and have made a commitment to increase the usage of Teaching Fellow academic contracts where appropriate.
- Health and wellbeing: our new Health and Wellbeing Strategy sets out the approach that the university, in partnership with the Greenwich Students’ Union, takes towards supporting and improving the health and wellbeing of our staff and students. The university is committed to understanding potential inconsistencies in how workload is planned and managed across our faculties and schools/departments and we have committed to deliver training during this academic year for relevant colleagues to ensure we have consistency and equity in workload planning.
- Gender pay gap: our latest Gender Pay Gap report shows there is more work to be done for equality in the workplace. We are working to reduce this gap and a number of appointments in new roles show that we are moving in the right direction. We have employed a national expert to work with us to help us eradicate our gender and ethnicity pay gap by 2030 and are absolutely committed to delivering this.
- Tackling workloads: We are in the process of recruiting 200 new members of staff to ensure workloads are reasonable for all staff. We are also currently undertaking a far-reaching review of our academic workload planning tool, with the trade unions part of the consultation process to ensure their voice is heard.
- COVID measures: In recognition of the extraordinary circumstances over the last two years, extra annual leave was awarded to all staff and in November 2021, staff were awarded a one-off payment of 0.8% of their gross salary.
What this means for our staff and students
The dates for the strike action are 1, 2 and 3 December. In addition to this, staff participating in the action will be carrying out ‘action short of strike’ (ASOS), starting 1 December and ending no later than 3 May 2022. This means that they will be working to their contracted hours and duties.
The university will be open as normal on strike days and many of our timetabled activities will take place as usual. The majority of our staff are not taking part in this strike action.
We are absolutely committed to supporting the wellbeing of our staff and meeting their needs, whilst also ensuring the sustainability of the university for the future. Our students are and continue to be at the heart of everything we do. We know that the last two years have been especially challenging for everyone and appreciate the concern that this strike action may cause.
We have published information for staff and students, including how to ask questions which aren’t covered by our FAQs, that can be found on the portal.
Prof Jane Harrington
Vice-Chancellor
