reached by the union leadership at that time meant that that contract (the one we are still on) is considerably inferior to the 'Silver Book'.
Indeed the 'new' contract was parl ot an ongoing attack on Higher Education where there has been a massive increase in student numbers without the funding from
government lo resource it.
This has led to major increases in levels of stress on all university staff (not just academics) and a parallel decrease in the quality of education students receive Veronica Fagan It was an unusual sight, 20-30 union activists picketing a meeting of their union executive at a posh London hotel on Wednesday March 22. There was no sign of the cause of it all, Amicus General Secretary Derek Simpson - he had slipped in the back way.
Three officials who worked for the union, Jimmy Warne, Cathie Willis and Des Heemskerk have now been sacked from their jobs after six months suspension.
This followed the removal of Warne and Heemskerk from their leadership positions in the broad left Unity Gazette by Simpson's supporters. All three were originally involved in campaigning for Simpson's
The three were prevented from attending the meeting as in terms of under funded library resources and overcrowded class sizes.
From the student perspective matters have continued to get much worse with the ending of student grants and, from this Autumn, the introduction of tuition fees. More show trials down on Amicus farm the union would simply have added it to their charges -bizarrely most of the allegations against them are for defending themselves after their original suspensions. Witch-hunt
Later, during the Executive meeting, Simpson launched yet anotner wilch nunt agallist a lett web site. www.amicus.co. and against more, unnamed, union officials, on fictitious charges of stealing email addresses'.
He also abused the small number of executive members who are opposing his megalomergermania.
The web site concerned has long been a thorn in Simpson's side because it has continued to publicise the various sordid stitch ups and corruption scandals that he and his cronies
This is the immediate background to the current dispute over pay; the longerterm background being that since the late '70s, when we had both a good national contract and reasonable pay, our pay in real terms has continued to decline on a have been involved in.
On this occasion Simpson even went so far as to accuse amicus.cc of being anti-trade union. Nothing could be further from the truth.
It's just that the vision the website promotes is of "an open, democratic, accountable, efficient, honest one, supporting its members.
Simpson's preference appears to be secret, paranoid, run in interest of senior officials, incompetent and 'stuff and stifle' the members".
For example a union that, according to its last accounts, spends nearly as much on its one General Secretary's 'housing benefit' (£44,752) as on dispute benefit for all its million members (£48,000). • For further information see www.amicus.cc
TOGETHER FAIR PAY year by year basis.
Hence our current claim for a Ls per cent increase over three years.
To date the action has consisted of a national strike on March 7 and an ongoing boycott of submitting marks and attending exam boards. In response many Vice Chancellors have threatened unlawful pay dockings of around 20 per cent (actual amounts vary from university to university). The anger of lecturers has been further fuelled by the revelation from a Times Higher Education survey that shows that 'fat cat' VCs and principals across the sector age pay rise of 8 per cent last year and 25 per cent for the last three years. is sauce for the gander". are clearly low paid Whilst the employers are refusing to talk to NATHE sons, action continues, they have made a derisory offer of 6 per cent over the next two years.
There is a problem with
FAIR To date the action has consisted of a national strike on March 7 and an ongoing boycott of submitting marks and attending exam boards. warded themselve an aver- NATFHE and the AUT are
currently going it alone. Whilst there is no doubt that, in comparison with the As NATFHE has said: 1970s, lecturers are badly "what is sauce for the goose paid, other university staff will continue to be a millHowever, for whatever rea- many years to come? the leaders of and the AUT while our NATFHE/AUT and other
relevant unions - in particular UNISON - have failed to get it together to coordinate state funded with all stustrategies on action over pay. the industrial action in that ludicrous situation where universities remained open during our strike on March 7 and then again during the strike over the attack on local government pensions on March 28.
How much better it would have been if pay claims and strike ballots (over both pay and pensions) had been coordinated permit united action on the same days. This would have resulted in all universities Delng totally closed on March 7 and then again, along with the rest of much of the public sector, on March 28.
There is no doubt that academic and (so-called) support staff will benefit from coordinated action over pay.
In particular, the assessment boycott will be much much stronger if supported by all university staff. watertight assessment boycott will, come the summer, not only put increasing pressure on university employ(who themselves already divided between hardliners and those who want the dispute rapidly resolved), but also on the Blair/Brown Government if students across Britain are unable to graduate.
In turn, if our pay claim succeeds, this will make a major hole in what is effectively a current pay freeze across the public sector.
It is therefore vital that UNISON and other unions reject the pay offer and immediately ballot on industrial action that can be taken in conjunction with NATFHE and the AUT.
Ultimately, what is at stake here is the future of higher education.
Will we continue to have a situation where more and more students are taught by an increasingly demoralised, demotivated, stressed and aged teaching staff (pay and student debt is such that many graduates no longer see university teaching as a viable career option), whilst they themselves are faced with mounting debt which stone around their necks for Or we will have a mass system of Higher Education, without tuition fees, and which is properly dents on living grants and This has resulted in the ALL university staff on decent pay?
page 5 of the scan
George Binette convenor of
the Central Services
department for Camden UNISON told us that March
28 was the most effective
day of strike action in the ten years he has worked for the London borough, though there was less involvement
of members in pickets and rallies than at the beginning
of the London weighting
dispute.
"The strike shut down all
but one of the borough's
schools, 21 out of 25 play
centres and effectively
Molly Cooper HIS PENSION WE LOSE OURS