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Why a whole day’s pay for a two-hour strike?

February 6, 2014

We are writing to ask Queen Mary University of London to withdraw its threat to deduct a whole day’s pay for strike action of two hours, which, if implemented, we believe would be unlawful, unjust and likely to seriously damage employment relations at Queen Mary.

As University and College Union members we are engaged in lawfully conducted industrial action as called by our union nationally, following a democratically mandated ballot in favour of action in pursuit of our pay campaign; the case for which has been fully put to the Universities and Colleges Employers Association.

We feel justified in pursuit of our pay claim, for current and future staff, and for ensuring that universities remain places that attract and retain the best qualified staff. It includes important demands about addressing gender pay inequality and low pay, and therefore is about fairness for all university staff. As such, we believe the strikes are a legitimate action to progress our claims, following the refusal of employers to negotiate further in response to the two days of action last year. Instead, the employers have imposed a below-inflation pay increase of 1 per cent, when we understand that the university sector is in good enough financial shape to be able to meet UCU demands for a fair resolution to the dispute after the falls in staff pay over the past four years.

We believe Queen Mary’s threat to deduct a day’s pay for two hours of work stoppage is an unreasonable and disproportionate response which does more harm to students than would our strike action. A reasonable response would be to seek to minimise disruption.

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In addition to risking further damage to our students’ education, we believe Queen Mary’s disproportionate response – which we understand to be unique among Russell Group universities – damages the goodwill of staff, on which Queen Mary as a community relies.

Members are engaging in industrial action in good faith, following a democratically agreed instruction from the union. Queen Mary management, on the other hand, is using heavy-handed tactics at odds with our aims of supporting social justice and that risk bringing the institution into legal conflict with the UCU, potentially costing the institution large amounts of money and seriously damaging employee relations and the institution’s reputation.

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Reader's comments (2)

As I said in my earlier comment on Jack Grove's article, the general principle is that employers are not required to accept partial performance of a contract. Two hours withdrawn from a notional eight hours is partial performance. The water is muddied by the fact that most older universities, which I assume includes QMC, have no specified hours of work. As I see it, legally the employer may insist on full performance, I.e. no withdrawal of labour at all. Whether the institution's action is acceptable from the industrial relations aspect is another story. Dennis Farrington
What could look like a petty dispute is in my view a collision of different principles. Peter Seeger sings along with his audience: "Which side are you on?". Class struggle within UK universities is undisputable at present and a reflection of what happens in society. However, a College cannot thrive under such conditions - just look what its name means. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5iAIM02kv0g

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