Author Archives:

Council of Europe LGBTI survey / Enquête de l’EU sur les LGBTI

Posted on by

From UCU’s nation Equality and Participation Unit: The EU Fundamental Rights Agency is undertaking a survey to look at experiences of LGBT+ people across Europe. The survey takes around 20 minutes to complete and you cannot skip questions. Some of the questions that are asked vary from UCU practice / policy for expressing LGBT+ identities and experiences. There is a free text box at the end of the survey should you want to leave any comment about your experience that may not have been fully reflected in the survey. One thing to be aware of is that in the drop down boxes the United Kingdom does not appear under U and is located somewhere near the middle of European countries. The survey is looking for responses from anyone who considers themselves to be LGBTI, who is aged 15 years and above and lives in the European Union, Serbia or North Macedonia as candidate countries.  The survey can be found on www.lgbtisurvey.eu The survey asks respondents about their experiences of discrimination and hate crime or harassment, as well as about their daily lives, problems and challenges they face in having their rights respected, protected and promoted. The results will feed into … continue reading

Newsletter – summer 2019

Posted on by

University of Leeds University & College Union USS Pensions There seems to be no comfortable end in sight for the USS dispute. USS have proposed three options as solutions to the ongoing valuation, all of which mean members and employers paying more, and none of which implement the Joint Expert Panel’s recommendations. Employers prefer option 3 which would increase member contributions to 9.6% with possible imposed additional increases after later valuations. It has recently been revealed, after whistleblowing from a USS trustee, that USS misled employers and members about the 2018 valuation, claiming wrongly that The Pensions Regulator had said the JEP recommendations would be too risky. UCU believes we can’t trust these people any longer, has called for the resignation of USS CEO Bill Galvin, and is exploring the possibility of legal action against the USS Trustee Board. We reject any members’ contribution increases, we call on UUK to pick up any imposed extra costs, and we plan to ballot on industrial action in September if they do not agree. See leedsucu.org.uk/pensions What’s happening on pay? 2019 pay negotiations with the employers began in early May and the Universities & Colleges Employers Association (UCEA) offered 1.8% (increased to 3.65% … continue reading

All members: extraordinary general meeting 10 July

Posted on by

All members of UCU University of Leeds Branch are invited to attend an Extraordinary General Meeting: Wednesday 10 July 12 noon – 1pmMichael Sadler seminar room LG.15 The meeting will discuss a number of issues that the branch needs to take a position on or plan for before next semester: USS pensions disputePay and Equality disputeHead of School appointmentsMisuse of lecture capture by the universityUniForum (another round of collecting benchmarking data on “the efficiency and effectiveness of administration and support services”)Discussion boards for in-course feedbackTimetablingCentralisation of admissions A full agenda will be circulated soon including motions submitted by members on these issues. The deadline for submitting motions (by email to ucu@leeds.ac.uk) is noon on Tuesday 2 July. If you want to submit a motion, perhaps with other colleagues, you can discuss it with any branch committee members beforehand if that would be helpful. All members are very welcome to the meeting. We hope to see lots of you there! (To new members: General Meetings are for all UCU members at the university. They are where we make decisions as a local union, so are fundamental to our democracy. They are hopefully also useful for finding out what’s going on across the university and … continue reading

Boycott of Trinity College, Cambridge

Posted on by

UCU’s higher education committee (HEC) today voted to officially censure Trinity College, Cambridge and will call on staff worldwide to boycott the institution unless it reverses its decision to pull out of the Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS). At a meeting of the college’s Fellows this morning, a motion to reconsider the decision to withdraw from USS was lost by 43 votes to 76. The union will set up a special committee to consider what action the boycott would entail and it may include asking HE staff to: not attend, speak at or organise academic or other conferences at Trinity not apply for jobs at Trinity not give lectures at Trinity not accept positions as visiting professors or researchers at Trinity not write for any academic journal which is edited from Trinity not take up new contracts as external examiners. (Post from UCU national website) … continue reading