University Staff and Civil Servants Stage Fresh Strikes as UK Labour Unrest Continues

Lecturers on the picket line outside King's College London, in London, on Nov. 24, 2022. (Stefan Rousseau/PA Media)

University staff and civil servants staged more walkouts on Tuesday, as labour disputes continue to cause disruptions in the UK’s public sector.

Members of the University and College Union (UCU) across 150 British universities began the first of three days of strike action this week as part of a dispute over pay, pensions, and working conditions.

UCU members will also be on strike on Wednesday and Thursday, causing cancellations of lectures and seminars on most UK university campuses.

Around 100 members of the Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union at the British Museum, working in visitor services and security teams, are striking all week as part of a dispute over pay, pensions, redundancy terms, and job security.

PCS members are also on strike this week at the Department for Work and Pensions, the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA), and the Animal and Plant Health Agency.

They will be joined by Border Force staff in Dover, Calais, Coquelles, and Dunkirk on Friday.

‘Anger and Frustration’

The UCU said it will re-ballot its members to allow university staff to take further industrial action through the rest of the academic year if their demands are not met.

The union entered the second day of talks with the Universities and Colleges Employers Association (UCEA), which represents 144 employers, on Tuesday via the conciliation service Acas.

The UCEA has made a pay offer of between 5 and 8 percent, which has been rejected by the union.

UCU president Janet Farrar told Sky News: “We’re very glad that university bosses have agreed to sit down with us with Acas and we remain hopeful for a way out of this dispute for everyone.”

When asked by LBC news whether students should be given compensation for the strike disruption, Farrar said: “If the students want to write their vice-chancellors and write to UCEA, who are our employment body, and ask them for a refund to their fees then they are perfectly entitled to do that.

“But that is where that anger and frustration needs to be directed, not at our members.”

A Universities UK (UUK) spokesperson said: “We understand that missed teaching time is unsettling and universities are working hard to ensure they can continue to provide a high-quality learning experience.

“If students feel their studies have been negatively impacted and alternative arrangements are inadequate, they should contact their university in the first instance. All universities have complaints procedures in place and the processes will be explained on their websites.

“If students are not satisfied with the response from their university, they are able to escalate things.”

‘Proper Pay Rise’ Called For

Speaking from the picket line at the British Museum on Tuesday, PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka told the PA news agency: “This is a world class institution that shows some of the greatest artefacts known to humanity, yet they treat their own staff appallingly.

“People working here some of them are on the minimum wage, people are claiming benefits because they are so poor. That cannot be allowed to stand.

“British museum workers need a proper pay raise, so do all public sector workers, and we are determined to fight until we get it.”

Trades Union Congress (TUC) general secretary Paul Nowak told PA: “This is part of a wider wave of strike action across the public sector and ultimately whether it is the British Museum, whether it’s our health service, whether it’s in our schools, we have public sector workers saying they can’t afford another year of a real-terms pay cut, so it is really important that the government listens to the concerns of their workers, listens to the concerns of their unions and delivers on pay.”

Disruptions

According to the latest data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS), 843,000 working days were lost in the UK to labour disputes in December 2022, which is the highest since November 2011.

The surge in lost days came after rolling industrial action involving workers of the Post Office, the rail sector, and the National Health Service (NHS).

ONS director of economic statistics Darren Morgan said: “The number of working days lost to strikes rose again sharply in December. Transport and communications remained the most heavily affected area, but this month there was also a large contribution from the health sector.”

The ONS data showed that regular pay growth was 6.7 percent in the three months to December, the strongest growth rate seen outside the COVID-19 pandemic.

But wages continued to be outstripped by rising prices. Once consumer prices index inflation is taken into account, regular pay fell by 3.6 percent in the three-month period, compared with the previous year.

The pay growth in the public sector is significantly lower than that in the private sector.

According to the ONS, during the last quarter, public sector pay growth was just 4.2 percent, trailing the 7.3 percent growth in the private sector.

PA Media contributed to this report.