Browsing Tag

UCU

9 posts
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UCU: Marking boycott puts employers under pressure

The marking boycott is a clear escalation in the dispute by UCU members, who have been engaged in industrial action since 2018. 145 UK higher education institutions will be affected by the boycott which could affect half a million graduations according to the UCU, as final exams and assessments will not be marked until employers meet the worker's demands.
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Bosses face wave of workers action across Northern Ireland: Trade unions must coordinate action

In this “post-lockdown” economy most of the developed world is facing the worst labour shortages since the late 1990s. Workers are facing rapidly rising inflation and huge increases in the cost of living beginning to bite into workers’ pay; along with a continuation of over eighteen months of exhausting pandemic working conditions, some outright dangerous. In the face of these crises, workers are increasingly moving to challenge their bosses and are becoming galvanised, at least at a workplace level, to demand increased wages and better working conditions.
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“Universities must not become the care homes of a Covid second wave”

Queen's University now joins Glasgow and Manchester in locking down halls of residence due to Covid-19 outbreaks. Within the first week of the university term, 30 students in Elms Village in south Belfast have tested positive for the virus. Fears of rising infection rates and the limitations of health and safety measures have been ignored by management in favour of forcing lecturers, support staff and students to participate in in-person classes without a uniform policy of sanitisation, mask-wearing and social distancing. 

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UCU Strike – Bosses on the run!

Only two days into 14 days of planned strike action by academic staff in Queen's University, the University of Ulster and 59 universities across Britain and the front page headline of the Times ran “University chiefs split as strikes cause chaos!” Some university bosses went so far as to publicly criticise the plans to scrap defined benefit pensions and declared support for the strike.