Late on October 13th the University and Colleges Union (UCU) had to send out urgent information to UCU members in Further Education (FE) that the planned strike for the following day had been called of as a result of a High Court injunction. How could the Union have got into this position? And what is the next step for UCU members fighting against attacks on pay and conditions?
Late on the Monday afternoon of October 13th the University and Colleges Union (UCU) had to send out urgent information to UCU members in Further Education (FE) that the planned strike for the following day had been called of as a result of a High Court injunction that had been sought by the employers, the Association of Colleges (AoC). UCU members were further instructed to work normally despite the fact that some FE colleges may have told students not to come in as there would be no teaching staff.
How could the Union have got into this position? On June 27th the Further Education Committee (FEC) of UCU had its third and final meeting with the employers where a full and final offer of a 1% pay rise was put on the table. The FEC discussed the offer and decided to consult the members in FE with a recommendation to reject the offer. That was correct as the offer went no way whatsoever to addressing the issue of falling real wages over the past five years.
As the FEC correctly stated in its information to members,
“In the last five years FE pay has fallen behind inflation by 16%, a real terms pay cut of over £5,500 per year for most lecturers. At 1% this year’s offer does nothing to address the years of cuts, it simply adds to the problem. It is below inflation so it is yet another cut in real pay for staff in FE. 1% is the thanks shown to staff exhausted by endless rounds of redundancies and restructures and straining under increased workloads. In contrast, Principals received increases on average three times the size of those they offered their staff in the last four years.”
Prospect of joint action
In the call to members to reject the offer, the prospect was held out of UCU members in FE taking industrial action at the same time as other unions, such as school teachers and local government workers. Given the fact a few months ago when the circular was sent out there did exist the possibility that other unions would be taking industrial action in the autumn, this joint call to arms seemed natural.
Unfortunately, as time progressed it became more and more obvious that the other unions would not be coming out. Any action that UCU members would be taking in FE on October 14th, therefore, would be taken alone, despite the fact that on the day before health workers would be out for four hours on the same issue, a 1% pay offer. Was it not feasible to at least take joint action the day before on October 13th?
However, there is another factor to consider. In the past when consultations have taken place to ascertain members’ views on proposed pay offers, if the result has been a sound rejection, then the next stage had been to go to a ballot on industrial action to see if members were prepared to back up a rejection vote with action. In this dispute the members did vote to reject the offer. The turnout was 15% and by 3,355 votes to 577 votes (85.3% to 14.7%) members overwhelmingly voted to reject the 1% pay offer. In addition, when the vote was taken, there was a clause inserted that removed the need for a further ballot on industrial action. The clause stated the following:
“IF A MAJORITY OF MEMBERS VOTE TO REJECT:
- UCU will reject the AoC’s final offer of 1% and remain in dispute with English colleges on pay
- you will be called upon to take part in an escalating programme of strikes at a national level co-ordinated with other public sector and targeted strike action within a national framework”
It was this clause that members either did not read or, if they did do so, it led to a lot of confusion at regional meetings after the ballot result was known. At these meetings many college delegates asked how there could be strike action when members had not voted for action. The inserted clause was not even noted by some delegates, never mind ordinary members who were not activists.
Given the insistence from some sections of the need for a separate and distinct vote on industrial action, rumours began to circulate that this would happen. It never did, so immediate steps were taken to organise the day’s strike on October 14th. Despite the misgivings of some activists about the way that things had been done, everyone agreed that all would be done to try and get a good response to the strike call even if, as one branch chair said, they were the only one of the picket line. Loyalty to the union would be paramount.
In the end, and despite the vote for action, the strike was called off as the employers, the AoC, went to the High Court and got an injunction that no strike could take place as the “the High Court agreed that the ballot used to justify the action was too old” (TES). UCU had to obey the injunction and accordingly instructed its members to go to work.
Anti-union laws
The whole issue raises a number of questions. Firstly, laws are still on the statute books which allow employers to challenge a democratic vote for industrial action by going through the courts. In other words, we have yet another example of how one element of the machinery of the state, the law, can be used to stop workers exercising their democratic right to defend their livelihoods.
These are laws brought in by the Thatcher government that should have been removed during the Blair and Brown governments, and the fault that they are still there can not only be laid at the door of the Labour government but also at the door of the trade union leaders who did not mobilise their members during those 13 Labour years to get rid of these laws.
Secondly, although the inserted clause when the ballot was taken was there for all to see, the usual practice has been for procedure to be gone through and for there to be two separate ballots. It did not happen this time, which allowed the employers to claim that the previous ballot for industrial action, a ballot that took place at the end of 2013, was too old to be used to call this action.
All unions have procedures that members understand. This does not mean that we are procedure fetishists. Times often arise when workers will take spontaneous action and walk off the job as something happens on top of everything else that finally breaks the camel’s back. Each case is concrete.
At this stage our members, in general, will not take spontaneous action; but they do want the chance to decide if non-acceptance of a pay offer AUTOMATICALLY leads to industrial action. At this stage they perceive this to be two separate votes and, I believe, the national leaders on the FEC of UCU should have known this. It should not be taken as fact that every situation of a battle between workers and bosses, between labour and capital, always has to take the path of going on strike, for once that weapon has been used there is no other at this moment in time.
The need for a militant strategy and a socialist programme
Thirdly, in the context of the present economic and political situation, the question of how workers respond to attacks on their living standards is of utmost importance. We know what the Tories are planning if they win the next election. On top of the cuts that are already in the pipeline they have announced more than £30bn extra cuts to finance the deficit reduction programme and to pay for the tax cuts, 80% of which will go those earning over £40k.
How does all this affect FE? A recent paper from June 2104 issued by management at City College Coventry highlights the problems. There are proposals for job cuts and worsening terms and conditions. The paper is frank is saying that the cuts stem from the government’s plan to reduce the national debt. It also states that the Skills Funding Statement, published on February 10th 2014, sets out a 9% cut to adult funding in 2014/14 and a further 11% in 2015/16. And that was before the Osborne announcement at the Tory Party conference of extra cuts.
The result of these cuts is that colleges will have to charge more for courses and will therefore put off more students from getting into debt, and there will be wholesale attacks on workers in FE. In City College the college debt has risen from £54k in 2013/13 to £2.57m in 2013/14. Management is therefore proposing “reductions to both pay and non-pay expenditure” so that in 2013 no cost of living award is made and none is planned for in 2014. Everything is under attack – sick pay, progression, staffing levels, redundancy agreements, and terms and conditions where pay will be linked to performance.
This is the reality of the economic and political context of the FE pay battle and all other battle that workers are engaged in. To achieve any success requires a thought-out plan for industrial action that involves as many members as possible and that is built for over a period of time.
Alongside this, a political battle is needed that has at its core a programme to get rid of a capitalist system, which can only survive by attacking the gains that working class people have made since the end of WWII. For if we do not fight back industrially and politically, the Tories have promised that they will reduce public spending levels to those of 1948. We know what needs to be done. Let’s organise to do it.
