The University and College Union (UCU) has announced three days of industrial strike action which is taking place at 58 universities across the country, including the University of Salford. This strike action will take place between Wednesday 1st December – Friday 3rd December.  

From the 1st of December UCU has also announced that ‘action short of a strike’ will start and this will take place at 68 universities across the country, including at Salford. This action will run for a period of up to five months.   

As your students’ union we are here for students and our job is to support and represent your interests. For some, this will mean supporting UCU to lobby the University for better working and pay conditions, however for others this will mean liaising with the university to ensure we can mitigate the impact of the strike action on your learning experience as much as possible.   

We strongly believe that academic staff working conditions are our learning conditions, and staff who are motivated and properly rewarded are key to an excellent education experience. As a students’ union, we believe in trade unionism and workers’ right to take strike action, and we support the campaign for reduced casualisation, increased pay in line with inflation, a closing of the gender, ethnicity and disability pay-gaps in HE, and a reduction in staff workload. 

However, we also recognise that for our students the pandemic has caused unprecedented disruption, whether studying at university or in previous education, and that many of you will, rightly, be extremely concerned about the impact the strike action will have on your already heavily disrupted student experience.  

For these reasons we are committed to supporting you, our members, to ensure that:  

• We continue to provide information for students, on a regular basis, explaining why the industrial action has been called and any impacts of this on the student experience.  
• To provide advice and support on how to navigate the extenuating circumstances and appeals procedures, as well as support in raising complaints where you believe reasonable attempts to mitigate the impact have not worked.  
• To lobby the university to ensure that as much of the impact of the strike on students is absorbed.  
• To lobby the university to use withheld staff salaries to provide increased hardship support and compensation for any lost learning.  
• To work with the university to ensure that they communicate in a clear and timely manner with all students regarding any impact to study, for example postponement of assessment or moving of deadlines, and to do what they can to mitigate the impact on strikes. 

The current industrial action is happening because of a national matter which the University of Salford cannot solve alone. This issue will only be resolved through negotiation undertaken by all parties; some ground will have to be given on both sides of this dispute for a resolution to be found. 

We urge the university to put pressure on UUK and UCEA to get back around the table with UCU to find a resolution. We also ask that the Salford branch of UCU puts pressure on the national committee to come back to the table to find an appropriate solution.  

Finally, students are tired of being used as leverage to serve political ends, and UCU should be encouraged to find alternative means to lobby for their goals, rather than so obviously seeking to directly impact the student experience.  

USSU Sabbatical Officers 

November 2021 

Contact:  

• Festus (President) F.Robert@salford.ac.uk  
• Akeem Ojetola A.Ojetola@salford.ac.uk 
• Cynthia Onyemuwa C.Onyemuwa@salford.ac.uk 
• Desrae Ogden D.Ogden4@salford.ac.uk