Plymouth UCU member
As part of the 2023-24 ‘Respect Further Education’ (FE) campaign, the University and College Union (UCU) has opened a ballot for strike action at several FE colleges, including at City College Plymouth. The ballot is for better pay and a more manageable workload. According to the ‘Respect FE’ campaign: “UCU research shows excessive and unmanageable workloads are all-too-prevalent in the sector. FE staff, on average, work two days for free each week.”
Pay, too, is a chief concern. Real-terms FE pay has fallen even further behind teachers in schools, who recently accepted 6.5% – the UCU says pay has fallen 35% in recent years. The UCU claim is for a 15.4% pay rise as a starting point to reverse the decline in pay and keep pace with inflation.
The ‘Respect FE’ campaign also points out that the FE sector currently has the highest levels of income for many years, plus higher average reserves and cash in the bank. We know that some college managements claim they can’t afford to pay a rise. That’s why we also have to campaign for full funding from the government.
The fact that teachers won a higher offer than the Tories originally intended should be an encouragement to any City College staff still undecided. Barristers secured 15% last year.
Striking may be a risk, outcomes are uncertain, but time and time again industrial action has proved that it has the power to make the bosses sit up and pay attention. The last year has seen workers from many professions take to the picket lines: teachers, nurses, junior doctors, driving instructors, postal workers, train drivers and rail workers, etc.
United
It is also significant that more traditionally working-class professions, such as postal workers and train drivers, have been joined in strike action by more traditionally middle-class professions, such as university lecturers and lawyers. They have begun to unite in the face of the degradation of wages, the erosion of working conditions, and the ever-rising cost of living.
The inept and immoral Tory government has forced through more anti-strike legislation, as part of its wider campaign to try to clamp down on any opposition to their rapidly collapsing and dysfunctional regime. The National Shop Stewards Network convened in Liverpool on 10 September to urge the Trades Union Congress to resist the latest Tory laws, that require minimum staffing levels during strikes. The fact that the government is pushing through these laws is evidence enough that Sunak and his cronies are running scared.
