The University and College Union (UCU) announced today (08/11) the dates on which staff will strike. 150 universities, including Cambridge, will be striking this month, in a dispute over pensions, pay, and working conditions.

The strikes, which are set to involve more than 70,000 people, will take place on Thursday 24 November, Friday 25 November, and Wednesday 30 November.

This makes 2022/3 the fifth academic year to be marked by strike action, after a series of industrial disputes over pensions began in 2018. 

Last Lent Term strikes disrupted learning over three weeks, with much Faculty teaching disrupted, and students discouraged from attending University facilities by picket lines. 

Supervisions and other College-based teaching were unaffected, and will be again. 

Today’s news follows an announcement from the UCU, on 24 October, that university staff across the country voted overwhelmingly in favour of industrial action in two national strike ballots. Both ballots, crucially, surpassed the 50% turnout threshold.

The UCU has said that strikes are avoidable “if employers act fast and make improved offers”, but that if a desirable settlement is not forthcoming “strike action will escalate in the New Year alongside a marking and assessment boycott”.

The trade union requested that universities give their employees a “meaningful pay rise” in response to high levels of inflation and demanded that “employers revoke the cuts” to pensions, explaining that the “package of cuts made earlier this year will see the average member lose 35% from their guaranteed future retirement income”.

University staff have been offered a 3% pay rise by the University and Colleges Employers Association (UCEA), which amounts to a real terms pay cut since inflation hit 8.8% in September, up from 8.6% in August.

UCU General Secretary, Jo Grady, has argued that this “is not a dispute about affordability”, but rather “about choices”.

“Vice-chancellors are choosing to pay themselves hundreds of thousands of pounds whilst forcing our members onto low paid and insecure contracts that leave some using foodbanks.”

“They choose to hold billions in surpluses whilst slashing staff pensions,” Grady continued.

Cambridge’s SU Council discussed the matter of strikes last night (07/11). Sources present at the meeting told Varsity that although an attempt had been made to push through a motion supporting the strikes, a lack of postgraduate students at the meeting meant that a quorum was not reach and so the attempt failed. Another vote on the question will be held at the next session of SU Council (21/11).

The National Union of Students (NUS) has supported the UCU. The NUS vice-president, Chloe Field, stated: “Students stand in solidarity with the 70,000 university staff across the UK who will strike later this month.”

After the affirmative results of the national strike ballots were released last month, the University of Cambridge said that they “respect the mandate that our colleagues in UCU have delivered” and claimed: “The university has always strived to minimise any cuts to pensions and to provide competitive and equitable pay. We will try to minimise the disruption to student life and we will be working with UCU to manage that.”