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BLM support, next steps for UCU committee, and letter to the VC

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Leeds UCU committee want to express our complete solidarity at the events that are taking place around the world. We are sorry to our Black students, colleagues and members who are having to collectively relive trauma to mobilise people to stand up to racism, in particular to anti blackness violence. It should not take these types of situations to show our support and uplift our Black students, colleagues and members. We know our solidarity means nothing if it does not translate into real action. As a committee we are committed to the following: 1.   Donate £200 to local anti-racist organisation Racial Justice Network and £200 to University of Leeds alumni Melz’s project Free Black University. In our next General Meeting, we will be proposing larger amounts be donated. 2.   Tackle racism and in particular anti blackness in our local branch by:a.   Taking an unlearning racism course for committee members, case workers and departmental reps.b.   Improving our internal mechanisms to report incidents of racism in our union branch.c.   Offering better support to our BIPOC members. We know these are very small steps we can take but they will not be the last. We have sent the following letter to the University of Leeds Vice Chancellor on 5th June 2020. … continue reading

Union survey – online and home working in HE at the time of the Covic-19 pandemic

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(Update 30th April – the university survey closed on 29th April) Our branch has put together a survey aiming to collect evidence to inform trade union policies and to shape a collective response to the enforced fast move to working online and remotely.  We want to find out more about your experiences and concerns, including Health and Safety, work intensification and a sustainable work/life balance, the responses and adjustments by management, the differential impacts on different groups of workers (eg by contractual (in)security, gender, age, care duties, disability, access to equipment) and longer term implications. This survey is for all staff and is being sent out by the three campus trade unions.  We would be most grateful if you could fill it in and share it with colleagues as widely as possible.  The survey will close on 12th May and we will report on it to the Leeds UCU AGM. We are aware that the university has recently circulated a (much shorter!) survey about working from home and we would ask members to fill that in as well (there is a free text box at the end where you can give detailed views and we would encourage you to do so).  Our survey is intended … continue reading

Teachouts 2020

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While staff are on strike, we are educating for free While lectures are cancelled, come and join striking University staff for public talks and workshops. Everyone is wlecome. The events listed here take place in the Quaker Meeting House, 188 Woodhouse Lane, Leeds LS2 9DX. unless otherwise stated (rooms are disabled-accessible). This programme of events may be added to – for the full and definitive list see https://tinyurl.com/vn7ot7t. February Teachouts Thursday 20th Olfactory Empire: Smell and the Other in Imperial India and the Philippines (1300-1400) The Climate Crisis as Driver of Financial Subordination? (1400-1500) Friday 21st Venezuela in Crisis: Political Stalemate, Civilian Resilience (1300-1400) Gambling with Power: How Electricity Markets work and who pays when they don’t (1400-1500) Monday 24th Re-imagining Youth Futures and Education: Critical (Visual) Insights from the UK and Brazil (1300- 1500) Tuesday 25th Building a UCU Disability Working Group: Kick-off Meeting (1300-1400) Making our own History: The Great 1971 Stepney Words Schoolkids’ Strike in Context (1400-1500) Wednesday 26th Birds on Campus and the Politics of Birdwatching (1300-1400) Current Climate-Change ‘Solutions’ and their Unintended Consequences (1400-1500) continue reading

Strikes starting Thursday (what you need to know)

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Text from Branch President’s email to members 17th February 2020 As you know, we will be striking again soon, starting this Thursday, 20th February, over our two disputes. This means you should not do any work on strike days (including working from home or anywhere else, and including anything you do because you work for the university). Don’t inform management in advance that you will be striking, and don’t rearrange things to avoid the strike days. Every member who strikes increases our leverage in these disputes. Every member who pickets helps to show our strength and determination. YOU are needed to make this action successful!  Remember, the union has financial support if the strike deductions cause you hardship. Together we can win these disputes! What’s happened with negotiations? Negotiations since the November/December strikes have made a little progress but not enough.  Our investment of 8 days action and loss of pay must not be wasted, we need to keep the action going to get solid sector wide settlements on casualisation, workload and equality, and to achieve fair pay and pension contributions. Check out this excellent summary from the #FourFights negotiators.  For a short USS update read this Twitter thread from UCU pensions … continue reading

Union emails during strikes

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We know many of you don’t check your university email when you are on strike, which is sensible to avoid getting drawn into work-related things. However, this can mean that you miss important emails from UCU. The union nationally and the Leeds branch  want to be able to let you know what’s going on – updates on negotiations, local rallies and teach outs, meetings to discuss any offers that come from the employer bodies, etc. So we recommend that you change your preferred email for the union to a personal address which you would look at whilst we are on strike.  To do this, log on to myUCU at https://ucu.org.uk/myucu and edit your email address on the Personal tab. If you haven’t used myUCU before you will need to register first, which is fairly straightforward.  Whilst you are in myUCU, please check your other details are correct (address, employment details, and your income band on the Payment tab so that you are paying the correct subscription). Thanks! continue reading