An “insulting” pay offer may reignite UK union members’ desire to go on strike but the battle to protect jobs will still take precedence, with most staff “resigned” to not getting a large rise this year, according to experts.
The Universities and Colleges Employers Association (Ucea) has finally revealed a?“full and final” pay offer of 1.4 per cent for most staff, blaming the sector’s “deteriorating” finances?for its lowest offer since 2020.
Unions – who had been pushing for an increase of 7 per cent?– have signalled they will recommend the offer is rejected, plunging both sides into yet another dispute over pay.
But the power of the University and College Union (UCU) – the largest of those involved in the process – has been undermined by its internal divisions. Its resources are also spread thinly?because it is?fighting redundancies on multiple fronts.
Gregor Gall, an industrial relations expert who is a visiting professor at the universities of Glasgow and Leeds, said that the “overwhelming” feeling among UCU members “will be sullen resignation” following the offer.
He said that although there is “considerable anger”, especially as the low pay contrasts with record high salaries and benefits for senior management, “the vast majority will see that if there is a fight to be mounted, it is not over pay”.
“The increasing toll of job threats and redundancies weakens not just the will to fight on pay but also the capacity to do so, particularly when the union necessarily has to react on a one-by-one institution basis,” Gall said.
As long as Ucea members are “not feeling even such a low pay rise will tip them over the edge”, he added, national bargaining will continue and again UCU will be forced to try to make advances on non-pay issues, such as workloads and inequality.
Employers signalled a willingness to discuss these areas last year but talks were cancelled when UCU called a strike ballot over?the pay offer of 2.5 and 5.7 per cent.
This ballot was eventually postponed?after members claimed that there was “no appetite” for a pay strike?when thousands of jobs are being made redundant across the UK.?
Instead, the union’s national executive committee voted that, should the Ucea pay offer for this year be unsatisfactory, this would “constitute potential grounds for dispute” and?”.
Ryan Burns, chair of the University of Brighton’s UCU branch, said that the offer was “pretty insulting”, but added “it’s not particularly a surprise”.?
He noted that the pay offer is a 14 per cent pay cut compared?with 2021, adding “that’s 50 days of free work effectively compared to just a few years ago”.
Burns, whose union branch has put forward a motion at this year’s UCU Congress calling for it to “rebuild the fight over pay and jobs”, warned that depleting pay could lead to more workers leaving the sector entirely.
Universities have argued that a substantial pay rise will further hike staff costs – already the biggest outgoing most face – and therefore increase the likelihood of further job cuts.
But Rhiannon Lockley, chair of Birmingham City University’s UCU branch, said “taking a pay cut last year has not protected jobs in any substantial way, in the way that some may have argued that it would do”.?
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