Motion in support of Unite UCU and PGRs as Staff campaign

This motion was passed at a GUCU Branch meeting Wednesday, 5 July 2023

This branch notes:

  1. The 2023-24 pay claim submitted by Unite on behalf of UCU staff, and the lack of an offer by UCU, despite an increase in staffing costs being factored in the budget approved at UCU Congress 2023;
  2. The concern over stress at work raised to the Health and Safety Executive by the Unite branch at UCU, after requests of organisational stress risks assessments were not acted on; 
  3. That redundancy notices have been served to the two organisers of the ‘PGRs as Staff’ campaign, who are employed by UCU on 0.5 FTE 22 months contracts, who are members of Unite UCU and UCU, and who are two of three UCU staff members with specific anti-casualisation remits; 
  4. The overwhelming approval of the report and recommendations of the ‘PGRs as Staff’ campaign at the Higher Education Sector Conference 2023 in motions HE23 and HE24, which note risks of lack of resourcing for the campaign, and recommend continuing the campaign and “adapt[ing] the organising techniques developed by the PGR campaign to other casualised groups in HE, such as fixed-term research and teaching staff”; and the similarly overwhelming passing of 2023 Congress motion 27, which resolves to increase organising resourcing across the whole union (HE and FE), prioritising casualised staff and PGRs.

This branch believes:

  1. That UCU should apply as an employer the same standards that it demands for its Members in terms of pay, working conditions, health and safety, and fighting precarity;
  2. That failing to do so is not only wrong, but also weakens UCU’s negotiating position vis-à-vis our own employers;
  3. That Unite UCU’s pay claim, including pay rises reflecting inflation and priority to lower-paid staff, is fair and should be honoured;
  4. That fixed term contracts of less than 24 months, which deprive employees of secure working conditions and of protections against unfair dismissal, should not be used;
  5. That the ‘PGRs as Staff’ campaign has been very successful, that it needs to be further invested on by the Union, and that PGR organisers at UCU deserve to have their contracts renewed and made permanent.

This branch resolves:

  1. To publicly support Unite UCU’s demands;
  2. To write to UCU’s General Secretary, urging her to: 
    • Make an offer to Unite UCU comparable to the demands of UCU’s current claim to UCEA on pay and conditions; 
    • Undertake an organisational stress risk assessment and work with Unite UCU to address UCU staff’s’ concerns about health and safety and stress at work; 
    • Commit to contracts of at least 24 months for all UCU employees; 
    • Renew and make permanent the contracts of the organisers of the ‘PGR as Staff’ campaign;
  3. To make a public statement of solidarity with the PGRs as Staff campaign, disseminating it in branch emails and social media;
  4. To disseminate to Members this open letter in support of the two UCU staffers at risk of redundancy, disseminating it in branch emails and social media;
  5. To send this motion to all National Executive Committee (NEC) members and support NEC motions aligned with this branch motion.