An overview of how issues and experiences of casualisation resonate with the issues we are balloting over from joint branch casualisation officers Joanne Armitage and Xanthe Whittaker. If you are a casualised member and would like to talk about striking whilst casualised, please contact Joanne or Xanthe.

Four Fights 

The Four Fights dispute encompasses concerns around pay, equality, workload and casualisation. It demands the fair treatment of staff across the sector and these issues all intersect. Casualisation is right at the centre of this dispute. Insecure employment exacerbates issues of equality and fair pay. Fixed-term and hourly-paid contracts are often used to fill up leaky parts of workloads leading to fragmented teaching. Casualised staff get paid less and promotions are more difficult.

Around 50% of teaching-only staff are precariously employed and 68% of researchers. UCU notes that these figures are not improving and there are currently 75,000 members of staff employed on casualised contracts in HE.

Those of us who are precariously employed are well aware of how casualisation feels; it affects our lives and sense of self. But the culture of casualisation erodes rights, protections and security for all staff. Casualisation can make it feel really difficult to complain! Demand better workloads! More pay!

****Vote YES! for secure work****

USS Pension Dispute

What do casualised workers stand to lose? 

* Staff on casual contracts and early career academics will be the most affected by proposed changes to USS; will have a greater proportion of our pension across our career subject to these worse conditions.

* Employee contribution increases will make the scheme even less affordable for more staff on insecure contracts and low pay. Already many casualised staff choose to opt out of the USS scheme

What about intergenerational fairness?

* High rates of opt-out among casualised workers already reflects an unfairness to those on insecure contracts, who face further insecurity in retirement if they have no access to a pension. For some, retirement may be pushed out of reach. Staff who opt out are already losing that part of their income which is made up of the employer contribution to pensions.

* How is the issue of intergenerational fairness resolved by offering early career staff a worse pension scheme? We need a healthy scheme—which USS demonstrably is—that continues to provide defined benefits to all generations, and a stop to the employee contribution hikes which are pricing people out of USS.

* Finally , addressing job insecurity would mean far less reluctance among people to join a scheme when their future in the sector is so uncertain.

Central to UCUs negotiating position on USS is ensuring that USS is accessible and affordable to casualised and low income workers with a plan that would manage the scheme and protect defined benefit pensions even for new entrants.

****Vote YES! for a fair and affordable pension scheme****

In solidarity,

Joanne and Xanthe

Email sent to branch members 27 October 2021 by joint branch anti-casualisation officers Joanne Armitage and Xanthe Whittaker

This page was last updated on 30 October 2021