- Conference
- 2023 National Higher Education Conference
- Date
- 13 October 2022
- Decision
- Carried
Higher education pay has fallen behind. Since 2009 our pay has lost around 28% of its value as a result of below inflation cost-of-living rises year on year. The extreme increase in prices during 2022 has brought this to a crisis point, and UNISON members working in Higher Education are facing real hardship as a result.
After three pay negotiating meetings in 2022 the University and Colleges Employers Association (UCEA) made their final pay offer: a below-inflation pay rise of 3% for most Higher Education staff and between 9% and 3% for those on pay points 3 to 19. They didn’t offer any more during the dispute process and imposed this pay increase on 1 August 2022.
With RPI inflation at 11.8% and our pay only increased by 3% this pay rise was a pay cut. The higher increases on the lower spinal points were partly being proposed to keep pay at legal rates, so were a lot less generous than they appeared.
Increasing numbers of UNISON members have been taking strike action for a pay rise that keeps up with inflation. With the cost-of-living crisis and greatly increased bills members simply can’t afford to live on the money that the employers imposed. Whatever the outcome of this 2022-3 pay dispute, these price rises are not expected to stop any time soon and so we will still need to bargain for a significant pay rise in 2023-4. Conference believes UNISON should seek to restore the buying power of wages in Higher Education.
Conference calls on the HESGE to negotiate with the joint trade unions in higher education and to produce a joint claim for the following:
A consolidated pay award of a flat rate of £4,000, in addition to whatever employers are legally required to pay to meet the government’s minimum wage.
1)reform of the pay spine to reinstate differentials between spinal points at the lower end of the pay scale, with a view to achieving a minimum spinal column point of £15 per hour.
2)agreement that all Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) become Foundation Living Wage employers, extended to all staff on campus.
3)equivalent increases in London Weighting and all other allowances negotiated nationally.
4)agreement with the HE employers to oversee the introduction of a maximum 35 hour working week in all HEIs.
5)a Scottish sub-committee of New Joint Negotiating Committee for Higher Education Staff (New JNCHES), as provided for in the New JNCHES Framework Agreement, with the main purpose of that sub-committee to be to deal with matters not currently being dealt with at the UK-wide New JNCHES.
6)joint employer and union action to eliminate the gender and ethnicity pay gaps, aiming for transparency and full sharing of data at both a national and local level and taking an intersectional approach to achieving pay equality for all staff.
7)a national agreement to reduce precarious employment in higher education seeking, as far as possible, for all staff to be employed on permanent contracts.
8)a national agreement to bring outsourced workers in higher education back into direct university employment.
9)a national agreement on hybrid/flexible working.
In addition, Conference calls on the higher education service group executive to do the following, alongside the national pay negotiations:
a)In the event that the joint pay claim is not met by the employers, seek to escalate the pay campaign, with a clear plan, in conjunction with sister higher education trade unions. This may include lawful industrial action to strengthen the campaign in accordance with UNISON rules relating to industrial action.
b)If the joint pay claim is not met in full by the employers for 2023/4, explore the option of a multi-year pay deal for 24/25 onwards with branches within the service group and the other sister trades unions in higher education.
c)build a campaign for all universities to become accredited Foundation Living Wage employers reminding them of the moral and business case of why they should apply for Foundation Living Wage accreditation and demand that they do so.
d)work with regions, branches and sister trade unions to achieve a reduction in the gender and ethnicity pay gaps.
e)work with branches to seek to negotiate an equivalent rise in all appropriate local allowances in all HEIs.