Round-up: UCU workers fighting the erosion of universities

Northumbria University picket line on Monday (Photo: UCUNUBranch / X)

At Northumbria University, Newcastle, education workers are striking all of this week.

The UCU union members are outraged by the bosses’ attempts to force them off the TPS pension scheme. Workers have been told to switch to another pension scheme, USS, that bosses think will mean lower contributions for them.

Those who refuse to switch will see their pay frozen. Whichever option workers choose, the “total reward envelope”—the total amount paid out by the bosses—remains the same.

The university wants to save £11 million by making these cuts.

UCU members have put forward an alternative proposal. But they say this has had no effect.

Branch chair Adam Hansen said, “The only thing that’s going to make management sit up and listen and understand why workers are so annoyed is if we come together out on the picket lines.”

At the University of Essex, strikes are planned this Thursday and Friday, next Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, and Monday to Thursday the following week.

There will be picket lines every day and a rally on 8 March. The university plans cuts that would mean one in ten workers will lose their job.

Bosses want to shut down the Pathways programme that supports mature students and others to go to university.

Essex is pressing ahead even though jobs have already been lost through voluntary redundancy.

At Edinburgh Napier University, members of the EIS-ULA union struck on Monday and Tuesday of this week and are set to strike on Thursday. They say that jobs and student education are at risk due to totally unnecessary and unfair plans for cuts.

At the University of Leicester, students and workers held a “funeral” last week for the academic courses that are set to be slashed.

Mourners dressed in black and stood in front of gravestones with the names of courses set for the chop.

A spokesperson from the Green Party group at the university said bosses want to “cut our teachers, courses, and services. Fund big, useless building projects.

“Workers have taken action. Students are rising in support. We refuse to watch our education be dismantled.”

UCU members at Leicester have struck for 29 days so far. The branch recently balloted members to continue industrial action. Some 71.5 percent voted for strikes on a turnout of 51.8 percent.

In Scotland, Heriot-Watt and Aberdeen UCU branches have announced strike days.

Heriot-Watt is set to strike for 11 days starting next Monday and Tuesday and Aberdeen for four days starting next Thursday and Friday.

Over 2,000 people signed a petition against cuts to language teaching at Heriot-Watt.

Working class people have seen their education opportunities eroded by cuts to universities.

These strikers are not just out to save their jobs and pensions, but to defend university education for all.

Vote for hard hitting action

The NEU education union launched an online indicative ballot over pay, funding and workload last week.

The government has put forward a 6.5 percent pay deal for teachers over three years—a deal that won’t match inflation. And it won’t reverse the around 20 percent real terms pay cut that teachers have gone through since 2010.

On top of this, the deal will be funded from existing school budgets. The reality of this means more cuts in an education system already overstretched.

And the government is suggesting that it might remove directed time, the only contractual protection that teachers have against excessive workloads.

The education system is at breaking point after decades of chronic underfunding.

Daniel Kebede, general secretary of the NEU, described schools as “running on empty”.

“Expecting schools to fund a 6.5 per cent pay increase over three years from existing budgets is simply not possible,” he said.

“The Treasury has made itself a laughing stock by claiming there are still efficiencies to be made.

“Chronic underfunding from successive governments has led to the severe crisis in our schools. Old equipment and broken furniture. Battered textbooks.

“Years of missed targets in recruitment have driven up workload, as have the numbers leaving and not being replaced. A failure to properly fund our schools also means fewer teaching assistants and larger classes.

“Rather than arresting this decline, Labour has chosen austerity 2.0.”

The indicative ballot closes on 17 April 2026. Workers should vote for hard hitting action to take the fight to the government.

Round-up: NEU members get set to take on bosses

Primary school teachers in Bristol are set to strike over management’s “culture of fear and bullying”, including the use of racist tropes.

NEU union members at May Park Primary School, which is run by the Excalibur Academies Trust, struck on Tuesday and are set to strike on 10, 11, 17, 18 and 19 March. Management has failed to adequately implement changes in response to NEU members’ demands.

One NEU rep said that “behaviour by certain elements of the school leadership has led to a complete lack of trust from out members”.

Elsewhere, education workers at Oak Lodge School in Wandsworth, south London, struck last Thursday. The NEU members at the specialist school for students with hearing, speech, language and communication needs are fighting against a restructure imposed by management.

They are fighting against management’s restructuring that would mean cuts to the jobs of two teachers, with an unacceptable increase in workload for remaining workers.

And it would mean cuts to working hours for teaching assistants, including weekly training sessions. Bosses already cut most of these workers’ hours last year.

There has also been inadequate consultation with meetings held without unions. Performance related pay is still being applied despite it being dropped by the government.

At Samworth Church Academy in Mansfield, Nottinghamshire, education workers are fighting against bosses’ strike-breaking.

NEU union members struck on Tuesday and were set to strike on Wednesday and Thursday of this week over management practices and workload.

The union has said that school bosses brought in workers from elsewhere to cover lessons.