Duncan Moore, UCU NEC member (personal capacity)
The University and College Union (UCU) has to fight for the future of higher education (HE).
One in two universities are in deficit. Lecturers are facing lay-offs, and attacks on conditions and pay, cuts and closures. Labour’s education secretary Bridget Phillipson has made clear that university finance is down to individual institutions and has hiked tuition fees.
Further education (FE) is facing similar attacks, with massive underfunding and low pay. Adult education is also in crisis. We cannot fight these attacks branch by branch!
UCU branches have boldly fought back to save jobs, winning important concessions because of hard-fought local campaigns and the threat of industrial action. These local disputes would be strengthened by a nationally coordinated campaign that boldly places the blame with the current marketised system and fights for full funding for post-16 education and research.
The 10 May demonstration can only be a start, and must be built on to prepare a national campaign.
A key part of our strategy should be to coordinate with other unions, including Unison and the NEU.
For a democratic union
The decision to call a national demonstration was taken at UCU’s congress in May 2024. But the union’s head office and general secretary, Jo Grady, dragged their feet, hoping to avoid a confrontation with Keir Starmer’s Labour government. The national ballot in HE was bureaucratically overturned, and FE branches left to fight alone on pay. But now Starmer’s full-frontal austerity assault means the leadership is under increased pressure from members. We must fight for full democratic control of our disputes.
We need a new left in the UCU
To help organise the counter-pressure of members on Grady and the officials around her, to aid the debate about what’s necessary, and fight for that strategy throughout the union, the Socialist Party argues that we need a new, genuinely democratic, broad left in our union, that brings together all those who want a fighting, democratic union.
Fight the right with class politics
A big feature of the debate at UCU congress will be on fighting the right.
The first day of UCU congress coincides with protests organised around the country, under the name of the ‘Great British National Strike’. This is not a real strike, of workers fighting together to defend our jobs, pay, conditions and services. It is a protest organised by a core of far-right racists using the language of the trade union movement. Their attempts to whip up racism would help the bosses keep working-class people divided, and make a united fightback more difficult.
There is deep-seated fury among workers, including UCU members. The Labour government is presiding over a disaster in education, as well as the NHS and council services. It has cut winter fuel allowance for pensioners, maintained Tory caps on benefits for families with more than two children, attacked welfare support for disabled people, while lifting the cap on bankers’ bonuses and pledging not to increase corporation tax over the lifetime of this parliament.
The far-right groups calling these protests, and right populists like Reform UK, are attempting to tap into that anger. Starmer is aiding whipping up nationalism and anti-migrant views. His immigration policies will exacerbate the crisis in higher education.
The trade union movement must take its place at the front of this struggle. Simply branding Reform UK as racist is not enough.
That means firstly preparing a serious struggle to defend services, jobs and pay; to demand the funding we need from the government. It means mobilising when needed against far-right protests, including providing trade union stewarding.
We need a new workers’ party
And crucially it means working towards a political alternative. The policies to defend education, the NHS etc will not be found in Starmer’s Labour.
UCU should build up a bloc of MPs in parliament that will champion the policies of our union: free life-long education; restoration of public funding for universities, colleges, prison and adult education, under democratic control; opposition to all casual contracts and ‘flexible’ working arrangements which benefit only the employers; to end the marketisation of education.
We should support candidates in council and national elections that will resist cuts. UCU should discuss with other unions about launching a new party that fights for working-class people.
