Category Archives: News

Show of solidarity with striking workers by Joanna Cherry QC MP

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A big turnout on the picket this morning for Joanna Cherry QC MP and Joss’s famous fry-up.

We were delighted to welcome another visitor to the picket this morning. Joanna Cherry QC, Member of Parliament for Edinburgh South West.

A pleasure to visit @UCU_HWUBranch at their picket line outside @HeriotWattUni today to hear about their legitimate concerns about pensions, pay, conditions & workload Joanna Cherry QC, Member of Parliament for Edinburgh South West

Don’t forget that there will be a BSL interpreter on the picket tomorrow from 09.00-10.00am and that there will be an online members’ meeting via Zoom at 12.00.

Some facts about the USS pension scheme

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Fact 1

It is NOT a final salary scheme. It used to be up until 2016 when our employers voted to change it to an inferior Career Averaged or CARE defined benefit scheme for salaries below 60k and Defined Contribution above.

Fact 2

It is NOT paid for by the taxpayer. Unlike the TPS or other local government schemes government backed schemes it is paid for by members who pay almost 10% of salary and employers who defer another 21% of salary into the scheme.

Fact 3

In addition to being cashflow positive: current payments into the scheme exceed outgoings to current pensioners, the scheme holds substantial assets. These have increased recently. The USS estimate the deficit has dropped by about £12bn to around 3bn.

Fact 4

Through strike action in 2018 we fought off an attempt to close the defined benefit (DB) part of the scheme and turn it into an entirely (DC) scheme. As a result of that action USS members will get 3 more years of DB = 1/25th of salary p/a in retirement.

Defined benefit (DB) = you know what you get.  Currently retirement income = (1/75th salary x yrs paying in) p/a

Defined contribution (DC) = you know what you pay in into a savings pot which can be used to buy an annual income on retirement. The risk sits with the member.

Fact 5

We are again fighting against cuts to our pension. Cuts to the accrual rate, inflation protection + the salary cap could see members lose 35% of future pension. UCU represents all USS members. When UCU members strike for your pension they lose 100% of wages.

Fact 6

Pensions are not a gift. They are our deferred wages. We earn them. A cut to our pension is a wage cut.

Join UCU​​​​​​​. Join the fight for your retirement.

HWU Branch Members Meeting on Tuesday 1 March

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A reminder that it is ASOS for the rest of the week before we resume strike action on Monday. ASOS currently consists of the following:

  • working to contract
  • not covering for absent colleagues
  • removing uploaded materials related to, and/or not sharing materials related to, lectures or classes that will be or have been cancelled as a result of strike action
  • not rescheduling classes and lectures cancelled due to strike action
  • not undertaking any voluntary activities.

Inevitably, a lot of work will have piled up on your desks and in your inboxes during the seven days of strike so far. Please do not work yourself to exhaustion over the next couple of days trying to catch up. Observe the action short of a strike. Heriot-Watt will not deduct pay for the form of ASOS described above. So please join us.

We will hold a members meeting on Tuesday, 1 March at 12pm to provide an update on where we are in the disputes and next steps. We have invited Ann Swinney from UCUS and member of the HEC as a speaker. The meeting will be held via zoom. Details to follow.

If BSL interpreting is required please contact the on-campus BSL interpreting service to arrange this via marion.fletcher@hw.ac.uk.

UCU Higher Education Disputes Survey (open to all staff)

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UCU have launched an emergency survey to find out how the worsening situation over pensions and pay and working conditions is impacting on you and your career in higher education. We want to know how you feel about the way staff are being treated, and if the collective disdain of vice-chancellors has left you considering your future in the sector. These aren’t nice questions to ask or answer, but the information gathered can help us demonstrate that employer attacks don’t just affect staff, but the viability of the entire sector.

Please take a moment to tell us how you are being affected by the crisis in higher education by completing the short survey at https://yoursay.ucu.org.uk/s3/HE-dispute-survey

This is open to all staff, union members and non-members alike.

What it costs to go on strike (less than you might think) and what help is available

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First off, a big thank-you to all those who have already taken part in industrial action.

Earlier this week our employers made perhaps the meanest decision towards staff in the history of UK higher education, i.e. rejecting UCU’s very modest and affordable way to take USS forward, deciding instead to side with a valuation of our pension when the most of the world’s economy was shut down or heavily impaired at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic.

University vice chancellors have today chosen to steal tens of thousands from the retirement income of staff. This is a deplorable attack which our members won’t take lying down. If these so-called leaders of higher education thought this was the end of this dispute, they have another thing coming. Jo Grady, UCU General Secretary

For our younger colleagues, or those relatively new to working in higher education, our pay has now been degraded for over a decade – and anyone who thinks the sector will magically award a substantial pay increase this year to compensate at the least for the highest inflation for more than 3 decades is quite simply living in cloud cuckoo land. Plus, don’t forget, for every year our pay deteriorates in relation to inflation, our pensions go down without the actions described above.

We are facing an unprecedented attack on our pensions. It has got to end and the only way to end it is to strike and take action short of strike (ASOS).

The prospect of going on strike can be quite daunting so we have laid out some facts about going on strike and losing pay, how much you can be deducted (it’s often less than people think), where you can get help and how to check your payslip.

Day 7 of the strike and we have some visitors joining us for breakfast

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The HWU UCU Branch picket being led from the front by Daisy

UCU President Vicky Blake and UCU Scotland President Lena Wangren joined us on the picket line this morning.

Continental breakfast courtesy of @josstified .

Strike action over both disputes continues into a second week

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Day 6 of strike action and we are joined by the Student Progressive Society

Today is the first day of the joint strike for both the USS Pension Dispute and the 4-Fights over Pay, Workload, Equality, and Casualisation.

We were delighted to be joined by so many students once again.

Students are in poverty, staff are in crisis, our fights to fix the education system is connected in more ways than we understand. Staff and Student power together is the only solution to the growing crisis. Divided we can not win, only together with solidarity can we stand to win. Students should support the UCU strikes, the UCU should support the NUS strikes. Until we do, the Universities will continue their snowball of cuts to pay, benefits, learning conditions all while raising prices on students. Cameron Fields, President of the Society of Progressive Students at Heriot-Watt

Industrial action will continue tomorrow at the main entrance we will have two more presidents visiting our picket line: Vicky Blake, UCU President and Lena Wanggren, UCU Scotland President. Please turn up and give them a big welcome.

There will then be a joint UCU/NUS Rally for Education outside the Scottish Parliament. Assemble at 12.30pm for the rally at 1.00pm.

End of the first full week of strikes: Your union needs you, and you need your union!

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Some of our hardy Heriot-Watt UCU branch pickets brave the cold as James Watt looks on.

End of week 1 and despite it being half term with many staff away on leave observation of strike action has been very good so far. Please keep it up. We need to send a strong message to our employers if we want to stop these irresponsible cuts to our pension benefits. Pensions which we have earned and which we deserve.

Please continue to observe the industrial action next week on the 4 Fights. Visit the picket line if you can. Picketing is the face of the strike, where we congregate at an agreed location to protest visibly and try to persuade our colleagues to join the strike. You can be on strike without picketing and the law on industrial action protects striking staff from victimisation for not doing work when on strike.

If you are unsure about what taking action involves and what it might mean for you please contact a member of the branch committee, or just pop down and ask. We will be outside the main entrance from around 8am until 10.30am each morning.

Staff and students join picket line on first day of protest over pensions

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HWUCU branch picket on first day of strike

There was a great turn out of staff and students on the first day of strike action even though it is reading week and the half-term holidays.

We will all be back again tomorrow and every day for the rest of this week, fighting to save all of our pensions. Please come along and join us if you can. We may even manage a celebrity visitor one of these mornings.

From the beginning of next week there will be further strike action to defend against deteriorating pay and working conditions.

If you can’t join a physical picket line you can drop into one of our online pickets. The first one is Tuesday 15 February at 9.30. Please check you inbox for details.

Strike action from Monday

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Strike action over pension cuts, pay and working conditions will begin on Monday.

Those who take part do not take this decision lightly, a day’s pay is sacrificed for each day of participation. However, if we don’t fight we stand to lose more. Up to a third of our pension on retirement; a continuing real value reduction of take home pay in face of soaring inflation; an increase in pressure and stress caused by unrealistic and unmanageable workloads, jobs and job security as more and more staff and services are casualised and outsourced; and the shameful failure to close gender and ethnic pay gaps across the sector.

Previous strikes have saved the defined benefit portion of the USS pension scheme, and more recently saved jobs when compulsory redundancies were threatened locally in 2020.

You do not have to be a member of a union to take part in industrial action and had have your voice heard, but it is advisable. Being part of a recognised collective bargaining group comes with benefits and protections. If you would like to join the UCU you can do so at https://heriotwatt.web.ucu.org.uk/how-to-join/ . It only takes a few minutes, it doesn’t cost much, and your subscription will be eligible for tax relief.