The University and College Union (UCU) is facing strike action from its own staff over the “deeply disappointing” decision to cut back a campaigning role.
Unite – the union that represents UCU employees – is balloting its members over concerns that two staff members who work on the postgraduate researchers (PGRs) rights campaign are at risk of redundancy.
This campaign argues that those pursuing a doctorate should be given the same rights as university staff in the UK. Unite said the initiative has enjoyed “huge success”, and UCU members overwhelmingly voted at the last congress to expand it.
“It is therefore deeply disappointing that UCU senior management is attempting to slash the staffing resource for this work by 40 per cent and proposing a 40 per cent pay cut for the very UCU staff tasked with tackling precarity in higher education,” a Unite UCU spokesperson told Times Higher Education.
