Strike reporting

UCU University of Leeds Branch Posted on by

Branch officers were advised by UCU officials on the afternoon of Thursday 8 December that members should now report strike action using Employee Self Service (ESS). For more information on this see the email to all members from branch president Chloe Wallace at 2.45pm that day.

This supersedes earlier advice not to report strike action yet, because of concerns that the university had retained and used information on who had taken industrial action to plan mitigation against future industrial action. HR had not engaged with UCU’s questions about this.

This post has been dated to 8 December when the email was sent, but was included on the website on 16 December.

Recovery of lost learning

UCU University of Leeds Branch Posted on by

Staff who teach are now starting to receive emails from Heads of School about the recovery of lost learning, so here are some reminders and some advice about what to do when you receive an email asking you to report how you will recover lost learning due to strike action. 

This post is the text of an email sent to branch members 5 December 2022 by branch president Chloe Wallace. The post has been dated to the time of the email but was added to the website 16 December.

Receiving such an email is not something you should worry about. All Heads of School will have been instructed to gather this data – you should not interpret it as an act of hostility from your Head of School or something unique to your School. It happens every time we take strike action. 

The reason why the data is gathered is because the Office for Students requires Universities to identify and recover any lost learning caused by strike action, and may impose fines if they do not. The OfS has become more demanding in terms of what they require, and this provides significant leverage for our negotiators. If, through this exercise, senior management can see how much learning has been lost and calculate how much will be lost if we are forced to escalate action after Christmas, that will put pressure on them to make an offer which is acceptable to us. It does not seem to me to be in our interests to delay the provision of this information, given that it is unlikely that any other method exists of senior management seeing immediately the disruption to teaching that has happened and given the urgency of the negotiations that are starting.  In law, whether or not you are required to provide this information depends on whether doing so is a reasonable management instruction – that will depend on the circumstances, and in particular an instruction to respond in a very short period of time may not be reasonable for everyone. It is also unlikely to be reasonable to ask hourly paid staff to make any plans around the modules they teach on. In most cases, however it will be wise to respond to the email to make clear what teaching was lost.

However, you must not agree to do anything to recover lost learning which runs contrary to the Action Short of a Strike which we have been called to take. This is an essential part of our action and our leverage – easily as important, if not more so, that actually taking strike action. 

You must not reschedule cancelled classes and you must not upload or otherwise provide any materials to replace lost content. In addition, it seems wise to say that you should not volunteer to do anything that is additional work – you are currently working to contract and refusing to do voluntary work. If your Head of School, for example, asks you to offer additional office hours or drop in hours, you should ask them to put in writing that they are instructing you to do so, and ask them to specify what tasks you should drop in order to make time for it. There is nothing to stop you reordering your syllabus, for example if the material that you would have taught during the strike is essential for students to understand what follows, but in that case you need to ensure that something is removed from the syllabus in its place, otherwise it is a form of rescheduling. If you are hourly paid you should not agree to take on additional paid hours to recover lost learning and should instead claim from the Fighting Fund for your lost pay. 

Everyone’s teaching is different and it is impossible to provide a one size fits all response to the question. In most cases, however, it will not be possible to recover lost learning whilst undertaking ASOS, and in that case you should simply say that the learning lost will not be recovered. Do not feel that you have to take time thinking of creative solutions – just say no. If your HoS subsequently instructs you to do something additional that is not covered by ASOS (eg additional office hours), you should ask them to put it in writing and to specify what duties will be removed in order to allow you to do it. 

UCU advice on declaring that you are taking part in ASOS is as follows (from the FAQ): 

If you are asked about whether you are participating in ASOS you should respond only in terms of what action you have taken/are currently taking, but not answer about future intentions regarding ASOS. This will mean that university senior management will need to keep checking for confirmation as to whether you have participated in ASOS and what forms of ASOS you have participated in and when. 

If you are asked directly whether you participated in ASOS in the past, or are participating in it now (whatever the timeframe, be it last week, yesterday, or today) you should respond truthfully, but you should not declare your intentions regarding future action. 

My interpretation of this is that you do not need to justify your refusal to recover lost learning by stating that you are taking ASOS – the University, and thus Heads of School, already know that staff are likely to refuse to recover lost learning because they  have been notified that UCU are taking ASOS and the forms which it will take. You are protected by the ballot from any disciplinary action for refusing to recover lost learning, and the University has not declared an intention to deduct pay for any form of ASOS. If you are directly asked whether you are taking ASOS, you should respond truthfully. If you are put under additional pressure from your Head of School or anyone else, speak to your local rep, or to me if you do not have a local rep. 

Chloe Wallace,
President, Leeds University UCU

Leeds March for Higher Education: 30 November

UCU University of Leeds Branch Posted on by

We’re on the march! Higher education unions taking strike action invite fellow trade union members, students, and the public to join us on a peaceful march through Leeds to demand better: our working conditions are students’ learning conditions!

What time and Where?

11.30am – 12 noon:
After picketing we’ll form up (get ready to march) from 11.30-12 on the Parkinson Building steps (the one with the clocktower – see here!). We will address the marchers before we set off so everything is clear.

12 noon:
We’ll march past Leeds Arts University, into the City, along the Headrow to form a big rally on the Leeds Town Hall steps (here)
A map of the agreed route is here.

12.45pm:
Form up rally on Town Hall Steps. Speakers from striking unions and across the movement will address and inspire the crowd using a PA system. We anticipate that the rally will end on or around 2pm.

More information:

Time and distance

The route is approximately 1.6km. We expect the march to take approximately 45 minutes. This may vary, depending on the size of the march. We expect the rally at the Town Hall to formally begin by 1pm. If everyone is ready a little earlier, we will begin.

The route

From University of Leeds Parkinson steps, turn left up Woodhouse Lane to traffic lights
Turn right onto Blenheim walk, walk past Leeds Arts University
Continue along New Woodhouse Lane, join Woodhouse Lane
Past Morrisons, into Albion Street
Turn right onto the Headrow, turn right towards Town Hall
(That map again)

Safety

Trade union officers and reps will act as stewards to keep the march safe. This event has been properly notified to West Yorkshire Police and Leeds City Council.




Department rep by-election results

UCU University of Leeds Branch Posted on by

Results of the November 2022 by-elections for department reps are below (all candidates elected unopposed).

DepartmentRoleCandidate elected
EconomicsDepartment repStefan Kesting
Language CentreDepartment health and safety repSara Montgomery
Language CentreDepartment health and safety repDenise de Pauw
Geography, School ofDepartment workloads repStuart Hodkinson
Politics and International Studies, School ofDepartment postgraduate repGeorge Aylett
Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies, School ofDepartment workloads repJohn Mowitt
Earth and Environment, School ofDepartment repNatalie Kopytko
Earth and Environment, School ofDepartment repAdam Booth
Languages, Cultures and Societies, School ofDepartment equality repSascha Stollhans
International BusinessDepartment repAndreas Georgiadis
Sociology and Social Policy, School ofDepartment repMaria Rovisco
Electronic and Electrical Engineering, School ofDepartment repPaul Steenson
LibraryDepartment equality repDeirdre Andre
Geography, School ofDepartment repAsa Roast
Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies, School ofDepartment equality repGill Park
Fine Art, History of Art and Cultural Studies, School ofDepartment repElspeth Mitchell

Here is the full list of department reps

Teach outs!

UCU University of Leeds Branch Posted on by

We are be striking but we love teaching and learning, so striking staff are offering teach outs on subjects which interest them, for students, for staff, for members of the community, for everyone, for free.

Teach out programme

Action short of a strike – a firmer line

UCU University of Leeds Branch Posted on by

In addition to strike action, action short of a strike starts Wednesday 23 November and will consist of, until further notice:

  • working to contract
  • not covering for absent colleagues
  • removing uploaded materials related to, and/or not sharing materials related to, lectures or classes that will be or have been cancelled as a result of strike action
  • not rescheduling lectures or classes cancelled due to strike action
  • not undertaking any voluntary activities.

Everything you need to know about taking action short of a strike

(links to UCU national website)

Taking action short of a strike

Working to contract

What is and is not ‘voluntary’?

Action short of a strike for members in academic-related / professional and managerial roles

Advice for migrant members on work or study visas

Media information about strikes

UCU University of Leeds Branch Posted on by

Details of strike days

For best small picket line photos/visuals aim for between 9am and 10.45am. There will be picket lines at entrances all round the campus.

For best general photos/visuals: end-of-picket rallies 1130am on Parkinson Building steps (by the main university entrance).

Local press contact: ucu@leeds.ac.uk

We usually can’t provide urgent comment because branch officers are working delivering education and usually can’t take calls, but if more urgent than an email please call the branch administrator on 0113 343 5904, who may be able to arrange a fairly-urgent comment.

On strike days please contact the national press office or, if on location, there will be a branch officer coordinating picket activity by the university main entrance, usually by a pink gazebo.

Contacts for UCU national press office

Media student interview requests: for practice interview requests about the strikes/dispute please email ucu@leeds.ac.uk. We will email the request around UCU reps and see if anyone can make time to do it. It is a really busy time for UCU reps, who are organising a strike on top of their massive day-job workload, so while we will do practice interviews if we can, we often are not able to arrange this.

The August update to USS members

UCU University of Leeds Branch Posted on by

As we approach industrial action, we thought it would be useful – from a pensions perspective – to post Mark Taylor-Batty’s August email to all USS members at Leeds, following the most up to date funding position at that time:

Dear colleagues,

An important and predicted change to the funding position of your USS pension was announced yesterday. The latest monitoring report published by USS indicates that the scheme is now in SURPLUS and no longer in deficit. This means in effect that the scheme holds enough value in its assets to honour all the future pensions accrued to date. 

We might anticipate that UUK and some of its member University leaders will try to spin this as a consequence of the recent April cuts to your future pension income. This misrepresentation has begun at some universities. If we were to remove the recent changes, and return to the position before they came in, it is clear that future pensions would still be 100% funded. No, the benefit cuts have not brought about this improvement, but the shift in market position, starting from the point of an obtuse insistence on the part of USS of holding a valuation in 2020 at the nadir of the post-covid market crash. The following diagram maps this development out accurately, charting the difference in the value of the fund with or without the April 2022 benefit cuts. 

A chart that demonstrates quite clearly that the USS pension is now 100% funded, with or without the changes pushed through in April 2022.

We should note that this surplus has been calculated following USS’s own means of calculating asset value, which we and at times UUK have heavily criticised as being ‘excessively prudent’ (assuming very bad future performance or inhibitors to performance).

What does this mean for your pension? We are now in a position where we can in theory return the lost benefits to USS members. At present, each month around 6% of your salary is currently going to pay for a deficit that does not exist, and this is at the cost of setting that money aside for your own income in retirement. This should be reversible.

There is a risk that UUK, and some Universities, will seek to profit from the improved position and argue that we can now reduce costs – the money they and you pay in to the pension. A cynical position would be that, knowing that such an improvement was clearly evidenced in the December and January monitoring positions, the UUK promoted the loss of our benefits in January so that they might exploit the predicted bounce back in asset value in order to cuts costs to member universities. Now, certainly, we would all like to see our pension contributions drop to where they was before April, or below that, and the UCU position is to pursue this once we have first recovered lost benefit (i.e. returned to you the tens or even hundreds of thousands of pounds of your future income in retirement lost to the recent unnecessary cuts). 

Earlier this year, in a joint statement made by the University of Leeds and the local UCU branch, the University here committed to prioritising the return of benefits over the reduction of contributions. This statement was the arbitrating factor that brought the UCU’s effective boycott of assessment to an end. There is no reason at present to believe that the Vice-Chancellor will not honour that position, and respond to UUK surveys of members on this matter with that prioritisation. I would nonetheless be cautious to watch now for communications that foregrounded the reduction of contributions as a primary goal. 

The UCU is soon going into a period of balloting for resumed industrial action, and from the perspective of the pension, this will be to seek to keep the return of your pension income on the agenda. 

Professor Mark Taylor-Batty

University of Leeds UCU pensions Officer

Member of the USS JNC

This email comes from the UCU pensions officer at the University of Leeds. UCU represents all members of the USS scheme, regardless of UCU membership. As such, the University recognises we have the right to contact all staff in that constituency. Apologies if this causes any inconvenience for non-UCU or non-USS members.

Have you got a UCU department rep yet?

UCU University of Leeds Branch Posted on by

Is there a UCU department rep for where you work? If not, there’s another chance to elect colleagues to fill any gaps.

The elections in the summer came at really busy times and there were people who missed out on standing for election because of all the other stuff that was going on, so the branch committee has decided to hold by-elections where there are vacancies.

These are not all-out elections, if you elected a department rep in the summer they’re elected for 2 years. It’s just for where there a vacancies. You can see who the current reps are at leedsucu.org.uk/departmental-representatives (opens in new tab).

A network of department reps across the university is crucial for maintaining and increasing the strength of the union and ensuring the branch committee learns about problems in different areas.

The role of a UCU department rep

UCU department reps are a point of contact for union members in that school, department, service or area, and they alert the branch committee to issues concerning members in their area.

Department reps are not always caseworkers and are not expected to represent members in their area with individual problems (although many department reps are caseworkers, usually supporting members in other departments). Some department reps have informal discussions with local management but they are not involved in consultation or negotiation with local management – all consultation and negotiation with UCU is done centrally by the negotiating team.

Department reps will try to welcome new staff and make sure they know about the union.

Specialist department reps

As well as the department rep role, the committee often asks for nominations for specialist department rep roles, such as:

UCU department anti-casualisation rep

Focussing on issues affecting members who are casualised: members on fixed-term or fixed-funded contracts and members who are hourly paid.

UCU department postgraduate rep

Focussing on issues affecting postgraduate students who teach or do other paid academic or academic-related (professional and managerial) work for the university.

UCU department equality rep

Focussing on issues of inequality and discrimination affecting members in the department.

UCU department workloads rep

Focussing on the health, safety and wellbeing aspect workload issues in the department.

UCU department health and safety rep

Focussing on health, safety and wellbeing issues in the department

Who would be a good UCU department rep?

Try to think who would be the best person or people to be a UCU rep for your department. Challenge any stereotype you have of what union reps are like, be conscious that white and male union members are more likely to put themselves forward, and bear in mind that while someone who is more vocal at raising problems might be a good rep it might just be that they are already in a relatively more privileged situation so feel more able to complain. A good union rep will often be someone that colleagues have confidence in, whose judgement they trust, and who is a good listener.

You can find out more about the roles of UCU reps at ucu.org.uk/rep

Standing for election as UCU department rep

The deadline for nominations for these by-elections is 12pm midday Thursday 10 November.

To nominate someone, simply email ucu@leeds.ac.uk, ideally include the word “nomination” in the email subject, saying, for example:

Dear UCU branch honorary secretary

I wish to nominate Maria Garcia for UCU department workloads rep for the School of Design

Yours faithfully

James Smith

Each candidate needs two nominations by the deadline and to have confirmed by the deadline that they are willing to stand to be eligible for election. Nominations normally have to be from UCU members in the same department, but exceptions can be made for very small departments.

If you have any questions about the department definitions or exceptions for nominations for small departments, contact the branch honorary secretary, Tim Goodall.

Workload and training

University of Leeds has a historically not-great record in ensuring staff have sufficient time off for trade union work, insisting it is part of ‘citizenship’ for most union reps whose workloads are calculated that way. Discussions are ongoing to try to improve the situation so that more reps have workloaded time off (or equivalent) in addition to citizenship. If you have any questions about this please contact the branch honorary secretary or branch president.

UCU provides training for UCU reps ucu.org.uk/training, and support and mentoring from more experienced union reps.

List of department representatives

September/October 2022 ballot

UCU University of Leeds Branch Posted on by

It will not have escaped your notice that UCU is currently balloting for strike action – you will have received a good number of emails from HQ about it. University of Leeds UCU branch want to emphasise the vital importance of us being able to exercise our right to strike action. In order for that to happen, members need to exercise the democratic right to vote.

This ballot, unlike previous ballots, is aggregated. What that means is that rather than operating branch by branch we are balloting as a whole HE sector. If 50% of members across the HE sector vote and if a majority of those who vote, vote for strike action we will be able to take action across the entire sector – a major escalation. In addition you may have noted that our sister union Unison have had run a further ballot and gained 65% turnout in a very strong mandate for strike action. Unite, the third union recognised at Leeds, are also discussing whether to ballot .Given the level of industrial action we are seeing across the country: amongst postal workers, rail workers, criminal barristers and ballots across many other sectors  – this is our chance to show that we mean business. 

If you haven’t yet received your ballot papers then you can request a replacement at https://yoursay.ucu.org.uk/s3/ucuRISING-ballotupdate – don’t wait, it’s better to have two than none! If you are away from home then you can ask for your ballot papers to be sent to your temporary address so that you can get your vote into the post ASAP.

Don’t forget to record that you have voted (same link: https://yoursay.ucu.org.uk/s3/ucuRISING-ballotupdate) – reporting now should mean that you don’t get multiple personal reminders to vote.

Please note that Tuesday 18 October is the last ‘safe’ posting date. See https://www.ucu.org.uk/article/12469/FAQs for UCU ballot FAQs