Higher education funding, market forces and Dundee
The Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) has announced an overall 6.4% cash increase in funding in 2007- 2008 compared to 2006-07.
The key elements of this are as follows:
1. The funding is above the rate of inflation but the rise parallels the rise in student numbers so there will be little scope to address staff student ratios which are at an historic high.
2. The announcement suggests that whether most employers do something to address workloads will be a policy decision not one based on resources i.e. will it be spent on other “priorities”. Similarly it suggests that almost all universities could indeed have found more money for pay rises.
3. Some 25 higher education institutions will face a real terms reduction in HEFCE funding. That means there will inevitably be talk of redundancies in some institutions which require a co-ordinated UCU response not simply a case by case response.
4. What will characterise the next year will be a looming awareness of market pressures as international student volatility remains a concern and as institutions prepare for the partial lifting of the cap on variable top up fees
The debate
A lively and welcome debate has started within UCU on how best to respond to these pressures.
The rapid growth of joint language centre ventures to position individual institutions to attract international students is an attempt by individual universities to steal a march on their competitors.
Individual VCs may think it makes sense for their institution (unlikely not least because of the PFI aspect of the schemes) but for the sector as the whole it is foolish nonsense. UCU was slow to respond to the development but branches and associations are now on the alert for such developments. We need a coherent policy on how to respond proactively to this development which has heavyweight political support and will not be stopped without a very substantial campaign.
We need clarity on the precise nature of the challenge and how best to respond. Moreover such a discussion must acknowledge the likelihood that further functions are much more likely to be contracted out in some form as a result of the language centre genie having got out of the bottle without serious challenge.
Those interested in the debate on this may also wish to follow the discussion group established by UCU member Sue Blackwell at kaplan-concern@lists.bham.ac.uk
At the same time, funding pressures and uncertainty, some linked (as in the NHS) to PFI type schemes, will cause instability and redundancies. This is what has happened at Dundee, compounded by management incompetence.
Part of the debate within UCU, which continues, is about the extent to which these issues are linked. There is no doubt that in a general sense they are linked and that we require some overview of what is happening.
Dundee
At the same time a practical strategy requires specific actions linked to the local circumstances or particular nature of the challenge. So at Dundee, where members prepare to ballot on action, the union has to give 100% support including public wider solidarity. The 25 English institutions with reduced real funding may well face similar challenges and in the words of Joan Baez (yes I was a hippie in passing) “there but for fortune go you or I”.
I’d urge UCU members to support the Dundee petition at http://www.dundee.ac.uk/ducu/ and would suggest you draw members’ attention to the wider petition circulating at www.petitiononline.com/fightnow/petition.html which makes these links.
Clearly both Scottish funding shortfalls as well as local management shortcomings are at the heart of the Dundee mess. The forthcoming Scottish elections make this a good time for lobbying which UCU is doing both privately and publicly, including through the excellent Scottish UCU funding submission which is at http://www.ucu.org.uk/media/pdf/l/0/ucuscotlandmanifesto_dec06_1.pdf
At the same time there is a link to the wider uncertainties and changes in both labour process and funding environment within HE. We ought to have a serious discussion about the nature of these challenges, not in order to pass empty resolutions, but to develop a practical strategy which adopts specific responses to specific challenges which members can organise around but within an overall understanding of what is happening.
We have enormous expertise within the union. It is time to use more of it.
A message from Roger
The UCU general secretary ballot result has now been declared and Sally Hunt has been elected. The union and our members face major and difficult challenges from employers and government in almost every aspect of our working lives. The turnout was just 13.9 per cent which in itself suggests the scale of the challenge the union faces. I wish Sally Hunt very well in meeting those challenges. To meet them successfully will require a clear strategic vision and a determined articulate response which members can have confidence in and ownership of. I will seek to play my part in ensuring that is the case through my continuing role as Head of Equality and Employment Rights Finally I would like to sincerely thank the hundreds of members who sent messages of support and campaigned during the election.
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A trade unionist all his working life. An activist and a proud campaigner, Roger has consistently worked to defend human rights of workers. As the leader of the Equality and Employment Rights team in the newly formed UCU he continues to unite the movement around equality and keep employment rights at the top of the agenda.
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