(Year 2 episode 9)

(What happened to episodes 7 and 8? They were affected by industrial action by UCU staff who are members of the Unite LE127 branch. Episode 7 was recorded and may eventually be released (as branch old news).)

In today’s episode, recorded Wednesday 14 May 2025: waiting for management plans about the university size and shape, and its trans policy; supporting members at risk of redundancy, call out for members to volunteer as caseworkers, new AGM date.

With Jenny Rivas Perez, Rachel Walls and Alan Smith.

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Transcript

Rachel

Hello! Welcome to the LeedsUCU podcast for members of the University of Leeds branch of the University and College Union. I’m Rachel Walls, one of your podcast hosts. I’m also a UCU department rep for Lifelong Learning Centre, branch committee member and saxophone or clarinet player in our occasional picket line band the Orchestrike!

Alan

And I’m Alan Smith, co-host for this podcast, and there’s a little bit missing from this script, which, it says, and also the branch administrator and organiser. We thought it would be useful for members of the branch to have an alternative channel for getting your local news because reading long emails or website posts is not everyone’s first choice.

Rachel

So we’re here to be a friendly voice from the UCU University of Leeds branch to keep you in better touch with what is going on, such as what the elected officers are working on and what opportunities there are for you to get involved in UCU discussions, socialising, activism and decision making.

[Brief music]

Rachel

And for today’s podcast, which we were recording on the 13th? Ohh, it’s the 14th of May 2025. We have Jenny Rivas to give us an update on the branch news.

Alan

Hi, Jenny.

Jenny

Hi there.

Alan

So the first thing we wanted to ask you about is, today, which is Wednesday the 14th of May, members have been contacting us, having read the Vice Chancellor’s new blog about green papers and white papers and a lot of people are very unnerved and want to know if we know more about what’s going on.

Jenny

Well, as a branch, we’re like everyone else in the university, waiting to see what is going to be in the White Paper. We’ve heard the the VC say in various different fora that the strategy would remain unchanged, it’s about delivery. And we met the Deputy VC and the Director of Finance a few months ago. So we were made aware of the scale of the in-year savings that the university was intent on making, around about £50million. Now we have yet another VC’s blog confirming those savings and the blog talks about changing again the size and shape of the university, but we’re still waiting to see the White Paper. We’ve been invited to a meeting the day before the policy will be shown to staff. We don’t know what’s in there at the moment. We’re just waiting for the publication. At this point, what we are stressing to the university is that we need them to meaningfully consult with all the unions at the earliest possible opportunity. We need to be consulted on how far and how fast changes are implemented, and we need to be involved early so that the voice of staff is genuinely feeding into decision making processes, it’s not just a tick-box exercise at the end of a process.

Rachel

Thanks, Jenny. And for the last few weeks, there’s been a note attached to the university trans policy on our website. What can you tell us about expected updates?

Jenny

Well, we are almost in a similar position with the trans policy. We’re told that it is in the process of being changed and the university has added some phrases in order to comply with regulations and the law on freedom of speech and academic freedom. However, we are waiting to see the changes. In a recent meeting with management where all three trade unions were present we were told that the LGBTQ+ staff and student networks had been consulted, however all three trade unions have pressed for the university to be demonstrably more inclusive for trans people, and to make sure that people feel safe in their workplace.

Alan

Thanks, Jenny. Another big issue at the moment is around job security. Is there any news from our anti casualisation officers?

Jenny

Well, I really want to take the opportunity here to just highlight the incredible work that the anti-casualisation officers, that Sandy and Dan have been doing over the past year as a job share. I’ve been sitting in for Sandy since he’s been on paternity leave over the last month. It’s meant getting very close to some of the work that they do, and looking at the casework that they take on – something which personally makes me quite uncomfortable because it brings back my own experiences of insecure work as a researcher. And they take on large volumes of casework, sorting out many of the problems to do with the ongoing contracts, the Fairer Futures For All and looking at things to do with redeployment or procedural errors with individual redundancy processes and, you know, just looking and reviewing over the casework that they’ve been doing, they’ve genuinely been improving outcomes for members. Which, you know, obviously for those members, it’s been incredibly stressful times and it’s really important work that they’ve been doing and I’ve just been so impressed with what they actually have been taking on and doing as caseworkers.

Alan

So the advice for members if they’re on, well, if they’re notified that there is a risk of redundancy to their job, normally that would be 6 months in advance wouldn’t it? is that they would contact the branch, that’s usually by emailing ucu@leeds.ac.uk, and ask for caseworker to accompany you to that meeting.

Jenny

Yes, it would.

Rachel

Yeah. Big thank you to all our caseworkers. Members may have noticed an e-mail about casework recently. We do have a request for more.

Jenny

Yeah. Yes. So our new casework officer, Jane Holgate, sent out an e-mail to all members at the start of this week asking anyone that thinks that they might be interested in becoming a caseworker, or indeed who just wants to find out a bit more about what casework involves, to come to a meeting on the 29th of May. As Jane pointed out in her e-mail, casework is one of the most important functions of a union. The union’s there for members to support each other, and we can do that through casework. And when we have trouble at work –  and it might be something big, it might be something small, you know, I’ve been talking about people on ongoing contracts and redundancies needing support, but it may also just be problems that you’ve noticed, you’ve noticed a problem with payroll or something like that and you need some support there or some advice – that’s when our case workers step in. But we need more case workers because we have lots of casework that comes through the office and, as I say, it can be big or it can be small, but we’d like people to consider becoming case workers so that they’re there to support other members in the Union. So we’d like anyone that is interested to come along to that meeting on the 29th.

Rachel

So have a look back through your emails if you want to find the details of that. OK. Well, let’s move on to talking about what’s going to happen in the near future. So is there anything in the Leeds UCU calendar, Jenny?

Jenny

Well, certainly on Friday there is a picnic organised – (quietly) is that true?

Rachel

Yes. This may not come out in time for that one, but we are hoping to do more since the weather is scheduled to be pretty nice for a bit longer. So yeah, do keep your eyes peeled for more picnic socials.

Alan

So whether or not this comes out might depend how nice the picnic is, because I might not get back to finishing editing it!

Jenny

OK!

Rachel

There you go. There you go. But yeah, we are committed to doing more socials, soon. Watch this space!

Jenny

OK. So, other things that are happening in the calendar, we’ve got an AGM on the 3rd of June. People might have noticed another notification coming out. So this was the AGM that we had to unfortunately postpone. So the AGM was originally scheduled for the 1st of May, but we had to postpone it because of a strike by UCU staff, which is a very serious matter, but I’m not going to go into it here. But it’s happening now, on Tuesday the 3rd of June. Motions: the deadline for those is next Tuesday, the 20th of May at 12:00 PM, so if anybody wants to put a motion in for that AGM, that’s your deadline. And we have also extended the deadline for nominations, because, in our rules, deadlines for nominations for committee close on the day before of the AGM, which is now Monday the 2nd of June. So that’s nominations for committee and for officers too. And if you want to put a nomination, if you want to perhaps stand for committee, then what’s required is two nominations from UCU members and also to accept that nomination. So that’s quite an important step as well that that quite often Alan has to chase people up to ask them whether they’re going to accept the nominations too. But just so that’s part of the process. Other things that are happening, we’ve got Congress over the bank holiday from the 24th to the 26th of May, and that’s in Liverpool. So here’s fingers crossed that the weather keeps good. Although I’ll be in a conference room the whole time, so I probably won’t, notice. And then we have a general meeting on the 12th of June as well, at 12:45 till 2:00. I think that’s the last one of this this year.

Alan

So thanks Jenny for bringing us the branch news.

[Brief music]

Rachel

That’s all for today’s LeedsUCU podcast. Thank you for listening. Please subscribe on whatever platform you’re listening to us on so you’ll know as soon as we publish our next episode.

Alan

And if you’re not yet a member of UCU, head to ucu.org.uk/join to find out more if you work in the University of Leeds in an academic or academic-related professional and managerial role or as a postgraduate student doing paid teaching. Wherever you work, make sure you join the union for your workplace.

Rachel

This podcast is made on behalf of the Committee of the University and College Union, University of Leeds Branch. If you have any questions or concerns, please e-mail our branch office at ucu@leeds.ac.uk. See our website leedsucu.org.uk for alternative contact details and for a transcript of this episode.

This page was last updated on 16 May 2025