Here we are again: this dispute did not have to happen!

The first day of our current strike on Monday 25th and the BBC maintained their limited understanding of current affairs in reporting our actions. They made the point that the poor down trodden employers are paying more for our pensions and even our own person responsible for directing us undeserving people was invited into the discussion. She was able to draw on her vast knowledge of this matter to offer a view about how both staff pay and pensions were at ‘the limit of affordability’ no less. This of course, is only part of the story behind the pension element in this strike.

Key to the pensions dispute is the valuation of what the pension is worth. This is not only about its value today, but tomorrow and the tomorrow after that and thereon. And it is why a joint negotiating group made up of employers and the UCU, was set up as the Joint Expert Panel (JEP) following the last Big Strike.  Even just over 12 months ago in September 2018, there was a belief that all parties concerned had the space to find common ground on the valuation. Yet, as the excellent Sam Marsh explains, it was earlier this year, May 2019, when the headwind behind this dispute was really consolidated.

It was at this time that the USS leadership began to throw their weight around and limit any possible agreement on a so-called ‘trigger’ mechanism as talks began to break down. Prior to this it was felt the trigger mechanism would provide a negotiated means to bring down the costs of contributions, something that all parties could agree upon. Then, like the third element in a famous Sergio Leone Spaghetti Western Billy-big boots Galvin, the CEO of USS, adopted a harder line, rejected the means of negotiation and encouraged the meek response from UUK that we see articulated today. What was lost at this point was the belief that there was “significant scope within the regulatory framework for the current benefits to be maintained at an affordable level without exposing the scheme to unmanageable risk”.

This current position of non negotiation apart from its patronising intent, demonstrates that while senior managers and CEO’s alike are quick to use the narrative of un-affordability, they offer little in the way of a solution other than the adoption of more cost and more risk loaded upon their employees. They do this while giving lectures on civic responsibility, wellbeing and talking about diversity.  Irony abounds.

It should come as no surprise that as academics and support staff in higher education, we sort of know a little bit about these things. The way in which pensions are part of a globalised financial system means that there are problems with pension schemes, private and state-run, all over the world. This is why UCU and its members have been willing to negotiate.

It is us for instance, who look at the demographics and the impact on pensions. As people live longer there is greater stress on pension assets. We know that as the age of the population changes there are proportionately fewer younger workers paying taxes so adding stress on government and their responsibilities. And some of our own experts can assess the outlook for investment returns with the knowledge that low interest rates puts further stress on the levels of investment that underpin private pensions.

We are not blind to these global pressures and structures. Then of course, there is the whole matter of how pension finances are structured and for whom.  Pension funds have a long horizon and their valuation is subject to method, approach and hypothesising. Even with this in mind the plain fact is that we have paid into our pension scheme over our lifetime and this is our money. For this reason we are well within our rights to demand a better say in how our pension assets and risks are managed.

The strike has begun because the question of the valuation of our pension scheme has again resurfaced.  It was always the can that was kicked down the road after the last dispute, but there was scope for negotiation and an agreed value via JEP.  A negotiated outcome is the compromise that any reasonable person would want to see. The work of the JEP in seeking to secure this, involving the union and employers, has been undermined by the USS leadership who have been limply backed by UUK.

There will be no turning back from the valuation, whether it is imposed by UUK or more sensibly negotiated based on the work of the JEP.

This dispute did not have to happen! A negotiated settlement was there to be grasped.

 

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Friday 16th March Pickets Playlists

After fourteen days the pickets took to their posts this morning to end the first phase of strike action.  This dispute is unprecedented in UK higher education and history is being written.  These playlists have been dedicated to those on the picket line; those people have stood through snow, wind and freezing rain and with those on strike, they still have plenty to write in this dispute.  The end is still to be made.

 

• We began our music today by reminding everyone that this has been tough. Tough for those pickets in all sorts of weather and the Minutemen with their lively rendition of ‘This Ain’t No Picnic’.
• Next up was a big thank you to all those students who have shown their support despite the impact that they have felt. We played REM and ‘Welcome to the Occupation’ in appreciation of their solidarity.
• Our message this morning to UUK is to ‘Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is’ with the disco track by Rose Royce.
• We know this action will bring with it change.  What change remains to be seen.  A new unity across our institution beckons, for colleagues across departments and disciplines.  We need to make it happen.  Sam Cooke and ‘A Change Is Gonna Come’. 
• We played a really powerful song and message from the women’s band, First Aid Kit. Behind this superb tune, you need to listen carefully to the lyrics of their ‘You Are the Problem Here’. 
• Here is another cover of that John Lennon classic ‘Working Class Hero’ and this time it was by local lad John Power, a great rendition. 
• Was there ever a time when employers who stole employee resources were called thieves? Say it as it is. The great tone of Kirsty MacColl can never be overstated. This one, ‘Free World’ seems apt for us on strike in defence of our pensions. 
• Our rally followed at noon and so to John Lennon and his ‘Power To The People’.  Power to the pickets, to the strikers and to the members!  
• Economy class for us, but this Joan Armatrading number is pure first class, ‘All The Way From America’. 
• After it is over… petty retribution, greater solidarity and collegiality.  We’ll have to wait and see. We can organise, we can agitate and we can educate.  For the cowboys came Johnny Cash and ‘Ghost Riders In The Sky’. 
• Use your education to stand up for what you believe in.  As we come towards the end of today’s music, we return to the political lyrics of the Minutemen and their ‘Price of Paradise’.  A great tune and great antiwar message. 
• We’ve played it before but this one by Utah Phillips is for today.  The message is for us all; for pickets, colleagues still in work, for UUK and senior managers.  The message is simple ‘There is Power in a Union’. 

We’ll be back in a short time no doubt.  The next phase of industrial action is being planned now.  We do not want this.  We want to get back to work, to teach students and research.  We have to call this out: Victory to UCU in this dispute. Victory to the pickets and to those who have fought over the past six weeks in defence of our rights, our pensions. The tagline #USSstrikes #music4thepickets #NoCapitulation

Fourteen days out! ‘The solidarity has been inspiring!’

Had the Universities UK (UUK) proposal to change the University Superannuation Scheme (USS) gone unchallenged many colleagues in the university would be thinking about changing their job now.  One person told us they were prepared to do anything, “a job in Tesco’s” just to get out of the role.  The pension proposals were this profound. 

So potentially impactful that one must consider how those in UUK, how those senior managers who have supported the stance of UUK – and some continue to do so – could not realise the damage they have been doing and still advocate.  In practice UUK are now removed from understanding the day to day operation of their universities.  They have lost the knowledge of how employees feel and fail to grasp what is happening.

Today we marched from the university to St George’s Hall to conclude the first phase of our strike action.  After fourteen strike days the feelings among the marchers, the pickets, the strikers, the students and supporters remain powerful and determined.  The discussions centred on how, rather than feeling broken as an unchallenged acceptance of the pensions proposals would have left us, the “solidarity has been inspiring!” That “the teach outs, the support from students has been incredible” and that “you’ll never strike alone!”

Yet the strike action and solidarity has done more than challenge the preposterous pension plans.  It has brought with it something entirely new and something that many colleagues have never before encountered.  Colleagues talked today of change of community feeling on campus.  We’ve seen staff involved with student union representatives and students involved in (UCU) union branches, bringing with a common purpose that seemed to have been lost in the audit-mania of senior managers, the one that laughingly suggests to the student that they are customers!  Many staff were proud of how the students had stood alongside the academics and professional service staff on strike, one saying to us “I’m so proud of the activism shown by students.”  We must maintain this sense of community on campus. 

At the rally today the speakers and those in attendance shared a universal message, a theme stated time and again.  That this dispute has become so much more than simply about the single issue of pensions.  Yes the actions of UUK has led those who work in higher education and students to find their voice, to find a platform and to ask out loud what universities are for, what they should be doing and how?  As one speaker said “in the course of the strike we have have discovered our strength… we can push back.”

As phase two of our action is planned be under no illusion that the solidarity has indeed been inspiring and that while much is still to do, there is hope not only in our hearts, but in our actions too.

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Thursday 15th March Pickets Playlists

We sent a few messages out today with our playlist, Day 13 in the UCU strike over pensions.  We loved the pickets, we have no regrets and as for UUK, your ideas won’t last forever.  So don’t cry baby, because our freedom is our inspiration and we won’t back down.  And when we win, we’ll turn the town red.  Remember the taglines #USSstrikes #music4thepickets

 

• The effort and work of the pickets meant we started with Frank Wilson and ‘Do I Love You’, indeed we do!
• Then second came a song of resistance and it’s Chumbawamba with ‘The Diggers’ Song’.
• Next came a classic from Edith Piaf, but this time with a Liverpool twist.  Our own heroine Margi Clarke and her turnout with Half Man Half Biscuit singing that we have ‘No Regrets’.
• We kept a little parochial edge to the music this morning with our message to UUK that ‘Nothing Lasts Forever’ and their plans for USS are doomed!  This is by Echo and The Bunnymen.
• Tomorrow, when those UCU members march towards St Georges Hall in defence of their pensions, in defence of higher education, they’ll be ‘Turning The Town Red’ with Elvis Costello.  What TV series was this associated with?  Answers on a postcard please.
• And when we’re on the march we can use this one to get us going.  A great instrumental play to move about to and keep yourself warm on the picket line from back in the late 1970s.  The Jam and the ‘Batman Theme’. 
• Then we went for something different with a classic from the sixties and the superb Janis Joplin, ‘Cry Baby’. 
• We changed the mood with a bit of country and bluegrass from the The Handsome Family and ‘Far From Any Road’.  
• Keeping with the country music mood we edged towards the end of today’s playlist repeating the messages to UUK.  This is Johnny Cash making it clear: ‘I Won’t Back Down’.
• Today we finished with a great song about freedom.  This is Inti-Illimani and ‘En Libertad’. Our freedom, our thought is the inspiration behind our fight for our pension rights. 

Victory to the UCU pickets #NoCapitulation #music4thepickets

Wednesday March 14th Day 12 Pickets Playlist

What a day yesterday was!  The rejection of the ‘agreement’ discussed at ACAS was overwhelming and right across the country.  Here we are on day 12 of UCU’s industrial action, that’s 12 days of strike action, and everything has become much more serious.

• We began today’s playlist with the words ‘you gotta educate, agitate and organise’ by That Petrol Emotion and their ‘Big Decision’. 
• Next came ‘Work and pray, live on hay, You’ll get pie in the sky when you die. That’s a lie!’ Utah Phillips ‘The Preacher And The Slave (Pie in the Sky)’. 
• Here in Liverpool we saw the pickets outside the ‘leadership’ meeting yesterday making sure that senior managers knew how we felt.  We played Badfinger and ‘Baby Blue’.
• The message came loud and clear from UCU branches across the land. No capitulation. The agreement was not good enough. ‘A Pair of Brown Eyes’ by the The Pogues.
• How do the pension provisions of VCs compare to those of casualised staff? There is no reason why this should not be on the table in the discussions about our pensions.  Here are The Stranglers and ‘Golden Brown’. 
• This dispute has the potential to become entrenched and much rests on it in higher education.  This is a classic 70s piece from Bobby Womack and ‘Across 110th Street’.
• SNP MP Carol Monaghan Glasgow has raised an early day motion in Parliament to defend our pensions.  This one is the John Lennon classic ‘Working Class Hero’ sung by Marianne Faithfull.
• In our workplace there are precarious workers and exploited staff.  Senior managers take responsibility because you caused this.  As Nina Simone sang, ‘I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel To Be Free’.
• Here is how the pickets are feeling today. Solid and that they stand together in this fight. Robert Wyatt and keep the ‘Red Flag’ flying. 
• We finished today’s playlist with the message that the UCU pickets united, will never be defeated! Inti Illimani and ‘El Pueblo Unido’.  A brilliant song of resistance.

Victory to the UCU pickets!  Remember the taglines #USSstrikes #music4thepickets

Finally, RIP our academic colleague Stephen Hawking who passed away at his home in Cambridge.

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Thoughts from the picket line: don’t stand alone

Pickets outside the Management School this morning

There are many moments during a strike when you should not be alone.  Strikes are draining.  It may look like we are hanging around and chatting, instead of working, but we are not.  Colleagues who are not teaching are worrying about their students, hoping the dispute will be over as soon as possible.  All of us are wondering how we will be affected by the strike: will we gain from any deal, and what about the immediate financial pressures?  The picket line serves a key purpose for all those involved.  It reminds you that you are not alone.

You are not fighting for yourself alone.  Others are struggling with the same worries and concerns.  It is not that you are immersed in some form of collective brainwashing on the picket line.  Rather, it is where you find a little solidarity, some words of reassurance and some encouragement, whether from colleagues, students or passersby.  I know I will always beep my horn on seeing a picket line in future!!

Receiving the details of the ‘deal’ on Monday evening was one of those moments when we needed to come together.  Most read the details alone.  Many will have been puzzled.  Was the very physical impulse to throw your smartphone against the wall an overreaction?  Were we alone in feeling betrayed?  We have stood our ground, but our determination seemed to have been lost in translation at ACAS.  Or was some more subtle game at play?  Were UCU wanting us to reject this?  Your mind can work overtime at moments like these.  Twitter helped.  The reactions were, almost without exception, negative.

But it was the picket line on Tuesday morning and, later, the union meeting that settled those emotions down again.  Talking to anyone with a UCU armband, checking your reading of the ‘deal’ against theirs, testing your reactions with others.  None of these things can be done in isolation.  Twitter does help, but I would urge everyone to join the growing ranks of pickets.  Talk, learn, find reassurance and encouragement.  There is determination out there.  And there is also an opportunity to think about how we build for the next sets of strike days.

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What now? Join the Union. Join the Strike

The so-called ‘agreement’ reached at ACAS smacked of two parties who have failed to understand the feelings of those who currently work in higher education.  One group, the employers have lost sight of what the consequences of their actions have caused.  Most senior managers in our institutions have convinced themselves that we are business-like, if not actually for-profit enterprises.  This view is some distance from the day-to-day experiences of staff and students.  It is the basis although not wholly the reason for the senior management disconnect from practice in faculties, schools and departments.  Of course this is compounded by the explicit inequality that has festered and burst forth within institutions. 

 

A striking picket voices concern – the old perceptions of what it is like to work in higher education are gone

 

League tables show Oxbridge near the top and by implication suggest other institutions are not as good.  Much more covert are the constant messages by managers within institutions, many of whom are ex-academics, saying ‘we have made this decision about you without your involvement’, ‘we have determined that you are under performing’ and of course the favourite of the arrogant academic manager, ‘your research – or teaching – is not good enough’.  This has become our own version of the Victorian deserving and the undeserving in universities.

The practice of senior managers has resulted in damaging material affects.  There are those academics who have been forced to change their contract, many others have seen their working environment deteriorate and we have experienced a huge increase in the use of precarious contracts for part-time casualised staff.  Universities UK (UUK) the employers representative, that is the VC’s and other senior managers, in this dispute are without doubt, the cause of this.  We have to ask, do they actually care?

The other group, the leadership of UCU, have approached this dispute in the same way as all previous disputes.  This has been their oversight.  What they have failed to do is to grasp the exasperation and frustration of members who have constantly had their terms and conditions rewritten without the support needed to push back.  Those old perceptions of what it is like to work in higher education are outdated and have gone.  Yet, by simply standing on the picket line with others, we provide our members with the means to overcome the isolation of poor management decisions felt when in work, in our respective department. 

The real strength of UCU is their membership, the intangible asset of the academics and professional services staff who know the systems inside out.  We have members who can critique the governance of higher education, who can dismantle the methodology used in the assessment of the University Superannuation Scheme (USS), who can evaluate university finances, who can analyse the political context of the dispute, argue for alternatives to the marketisation pursued by government and so on.  We have experts in this union who regularly shape policies for governments, health services and other major institutions.  They’re clever!  The leadership of UCU must commit to democratising the processes of decision-making, while keeping the conduit with ACAS and UUK open.  This is not an easy thing to achieve, but it is why they are there.

 

We must convince those not on strike to join us and show them how the failed decision-making of UUK has led to this dispute

Yet the branches too have to think this through in a more strategic light.  UUK could well revert to their original decision and plan to implement the change convinced amongst themselves that UCU members will not hold out.  The immediate step for local branches now is to convince those who are in USS but not in UCU that the union needs them and they need to be part of the union.  They must be clear on: the financial devastation to their retirement, the failed pensions methodology used by UUK that is the basis of their decision to end defined benefits, that if UUK win this dispute more attacks on terms and conditions will follow.  Our members have produced the evidence to support this so let’s use it.  Branches must convince those who are not on strike that they will suffer from the draconian measures of senior managers in higher education when this if over if a victory is not ensured.

Rhetoric is easy to find within higher education.  However, I have not met anyone on strike who does not regard the views of students as highly important.  Our members care about the students.  So much so that in this case it may well be that the heart and soul of the UK higher education system is currently being shaped in a way that will determine its purpose for a generation or more.

Please, if you work in the Management School or elsewhere in the university and you have yet to commit, then find out more about this dispute.  Help yourself and your colleagues by joining the strike.  If at this stage you are not in a union, then join the union.  More information on today’s development can be found here.

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Tuesday March 13th Day 11 Pickets Playlist

Today was day 11 in week 4 of the longest academic strike ever.  We began in February and we now approach the middle of March.  Today was the morning after the night before.  Yesterday evening the proposed UUK/UCU agreement was released and it showed a basis for agreement – and the end of the strike – that was far from what most expected.  The devil is in the detail.  The principle of defined benefits is lost somewhere in the opaque announcement and the effort put in by pickets undervalued.

With this on the table, and Twitter facing a meltdown from UCU members, so began today’s Pickets Playlist.

• The mood from most people involved in the dispute, certainly those academics and professional service staff on strike, was that something has to change in higher education.  We began then with a simple message from Bob Dylan and ‘The Times They Are A Changin’.  
• Then today we heard from the man responsible for managing the UK economy, responsible for continuing austerity, that we’re all in better shape.  The so-called light at the end of the tunnel.  Deficit reduction?  Amy Winehouse and the great tune ‘Back to Black’. 
• What a performance and we stayed with the power of the voice – a metaphor for the pickets – with Siouxsie and the Banshees and ‘Kiss Them For Me’.  We are in danger of kissing our pensions goodbye.  
• Every day it is important to show solidarity with the pickets.  If you haven’t done so yet, go talk with them and take them a cup of tea.  Ask them what they think about the ‘agreement’. Here is the superb Tracy Chapman and her ‘Fast Car’. 
• We changed direction in response to the articulate voices from Glasgow UCU members heard earlier on BBC radio.  For them we played the Sensational Alex Harvey Band from Scotland and a kind of anarchy glam from back in the 70s: ‘Delilah’.
• When was the last time you went to the Big Capital?  Well, next time you go to London, say you’re doing work and go first class.  Then nip down to ‘Baker Street’ but watch those expenses don’t get out of hand. This is Gerry Rafferty.  
• Playing The Clash and ‘Spanish Bombs’ needs nothing added.  What a tune!
• And now this great old Scottish folk song of resistance, Roaring Jack, Alistair Hulett and ‘The Old Divide and Rule’.  Watch this play out over the next few days.
• As we wind the music down here is the legendary tone of Paul Robeson and the famous ballad of ‘Joe Hill’. Great vocals. 
• We finished this morning with Joan Baez and her version of ‘Bread and Roses’.

As the day moved on more and more pickets were reminding UCU that the tag line #NoCapitulation means exactly that.  Victory to the UCU pickets and their fight against the unjust decision of UUK to dismantle pension provision and security in retirement.

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Monday March 12th Day 10 Pickets Playlist

Week 4 of the dispute and we got off to a good start with the Pickets Playlist. 

Following the revelations over the weekend about exuberant pay and perks there was an early theme showing from today’s sounds.

 

• We began with some empathy, a thought for our poor senior managers who simply don’t know where the next business class air travel is coming from.  It was Aloe Blacc who suggested ‘I Need A Dollar’ – of course they do!
• What is the theme today? Who knows – what can I say?  Curtis Mayfield came next and ‘Pusherman’  as we wondered about your views on the decadence of senior managers in Higher Education. 
• We kept the same theme with The Clash and ‘Bankrobber’ and then Creedence Clearwater Revival and their ‘Bad Moon Rising’. 
• The anger from the rank and file has been bubbling throughout this dispute.  Is there a lack of leadership in our system of higher education?  Someone who knew how to capture feelings of dismay and fatalism was Jimi Hendrix with his song ‘Hey Joe’.  
• We need to change the narrative and the mood and forget any lack of moral control shown in the sector.  This dispute is about those UCU members on strike, those on the picket line fighting for what is right. They are the ‘Heroes’ and David Bowie, of course.
• We then played Bob and Earl’s ‘Harlem Shuffle’ showing that there is real soul to our actions. 
• The future of higher education rest with the young academics, PhD researchers and students.  This dispute is for you and for what we can create together.  Mott the Hoople and ‘All the Young Pickets (Dudes)’.
• Before we finish we have to get our Billy Bragg tune of the day in.  His ‘Between The Wars’ reminds us of the faith in our pickets! 
• We finished today with a short clear message from Woody Guthrie. You know what, ‘All You Fascists Bound To Lose’.  Victory to the UCU Pickets!

 

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Thursday March 8th Day 9 Pickets Playlist

This has been the ninth day of our strike. I cannot recall a more serious withdrawal of labour in academia. 

Today is International Women’s Day and this brings a sharper edge to our dispute. Women have always been at the forefront of labour struggles and this dispute is highly gendered.  Those seeking to impose the changes to our pensions are fully aware that this dispute impacts on women disproportionately.

Our playlist for today was a real varied one. Some slowies, a bit of jazz and pop and then some heavy energetic stuff towards the end (we thought).  The message remains: we stand together in our fight against an unjust group of decision-makers.  If you are reading this remember our taglines are #music4thepickets and #USSstrikes and for today #IWD2018

• We started really softly this morning to capture the snowy moment of the picket line.  This one is a bit biblical, but beautiful non the less, a 1941 version by Billie Holiday ‘God Bless The Child’.  
• And we kept with the oldies with the great Cab Calloway and ‘Minnie the Moocher’. This is an absolute belter of a tune with its origins in the Harlem Cotton Club.
• Staying with a little bit of jazz we played Louie Prima and ‘Just A Gigolo’. While the pickets stood together we wondered who the ‘I Ain’t Got Nobody’ bit referred to?
• The Liverpool bias is built into this playlist I’m afraid and we had a bit of a change with its ‘Sinful’ by local lad Pete Wylie from the 1980s.  To paraphrase ‘Hey Janet, I’ve never understood when UUK are so wicked, why should we be good?’   We are pleased to say that Pete retweeted this to show support for our cause.
• What will it be like if UUK are able to impose their mad plans to decimate our pensions? Here’s an apocalyptic view from David Bowie, ‘Five Years’.  RIP man.
• Billy Bragg came next. We can’t have a playlist for a picket line without Billy can we? We indulged ourselves with his tune today ‘Scousers Never Buy the Sun’.  When he found out Billy retweeted to show his support.
• And then we got a bit lively to finish off.  Someone needs to do an analysis of this one and let me know what it is about, but its angry!  Its the Subhumans and Subvert City.  This lot are really mad at UUK, oh yes.
• Then came Twisted Sister and you know what, ‘We’re Not Gonna Take It’ – ok?  UUK,  understand?  Got it?  In fact, “It’s enough to make you stop believing when tears come fast and furious” and we followed with The Jam and ‘A Town Called Malice’.  
• We thought we had finished today with Mick Jones and The Clash in the studio with ‘Stay Free’ – that’s the message to the pickets today. 
• But we found two lurking tunes ready to play and first up was Grace Petrie reminding us that we can fight back with her fantastic song called ‘Maggie Thatcher’s Dream’.  
• And then finally, finally, came an older thought.  Some of us can remember the Allende government back in the 70s and what happened when Pinochet slaughtered people.  So too does Alun Parry with this story about ‘Julio From Chile’ and we reflected on how unity and solidarity really does help. 

So by the end of today’s playlist we have had support from Pete Hooton from The Farm, Ian Prowse, Amsterdam, Billy Bragg and Pete Wylie, each showing their solidarity with our dispute.  Thanks to them and thanks to all for listening and reading.  Victory to the UCU pickets and keep your heads held high! #USSstrike #music4thepickets

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