How much is Imperial’s pay offer really worth compared to UCEA’s? Less than you might expect.

Imperial College management claim that their 2023-24 pay offer is significantly better than the national pay offer from the University and College’s Employer’s Association (UCEA) 2023-24 offer to the institutes involved in national pay bargaining. Here we refute this claim.  

There is little doubt that Imperial is better off financially than the average UK university, as past surpluses confirm. In fact, it would be a source of embarrassment if we lagged behind given our deserved reputation for attracting research funding and students, a good proportion paying overseas fees. So, it is fair to ask how much more is Imperial’s 2023-24 pay offer worth compared to the UCEA offer, which, necessarily has to be affordable not just to the average UK university, but to those struggling financially.

We have used College’s figures to make a direct comparison between the two offers, applying the terms of both offers to the same distribution of staff pay at Imperial. By adding together the costs from each quantile of 250 staff, grouped in salary order, we can compare the overall cost of the two offers.

First, it is important to understand what each offer amounts to: UCEA’s gives an early payment in February and then tops that up to 5% in August. Imperial has an early payment in May, and then tops it up to the larger of 5.5% or £2500 in August.  Hence UCEA’s offer gives three months of extra payments compared to Imperial’s. To take that into account in a fair manner, we calculate the total cost of either offer from February 2023 to August 2024, when the next pay settlement is due. We also apply the terms of both offers to all staff. All UCEA members we are aware of have already started paying the February element of the offer to all staff, even though UCU nationally are in dispute over this.

In fact, the details of each offer tend to play off against each other’s – UCEA gives a smaller early payment but in February, not May, and, while Imperial is offering 0.5% more, it also has a maximum of £5000 while UCEA members are applying 5% across the board. Taking all of these effects into account, Imperial’s offer will cost it just 0.24% more than UCEA’s up to August 2024: while the Imperial offer is worth more than UCEA’s it hardly reflects the ability of Imperial to pay its staff more.

Finally, some of you may have noticed that Imperial is claiming its offer is worth on average 7.1%. That is quite a remarkable number considering the cost of the offer, according to College, is significantly less than that. In fact, that 7.1% figure has been calculated by combining the May increase as a lump sum, and then adding that to the 5.5% increase in August (plus a small error in weighting the lowest paid quantile that adds 0.1%). Apart from the error, this approach might be a valid calculation in comparing the Imperial offer to UCEA’s but it is not actually what the offer amounts to as a consolidated salary rise: it effectively inflates the 5.5% rise with a one-off payment.

Imperial’s management are trying to give the impression that their offer is worth significantly more than the 0.5% difference in the headline rate of 5.5% compared to UCEA’s 5.0%. In fact it will cost them 0.24%, slightly less than half of 0.5% more to implement compared to UCEA’s. Imperial can afford to do rather better than that.

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Full calculations can be seen in this spreadsheet: ImperialvsUCEAOffersCompWeb

We are on strike to defend our pay.

With general inflation at around 10% for the last 2 years, and augmented hikes on everyday overheads such as food, energy bills, and housing, people and companies are feeling severe financial pressure.

If organisations do not proportionally increase their workers’ wages in line with the increased cost of living, then they become effectively poorer and less able to live their lives with dignity.

Imperial College conducts pay bargaining with its local Joint Trade Union (JTU) branches. Last year management’s imposition of a 3.3% pay offer without JTU agreement was simply too much for staff to bear: a 3% pay award with inflation at over 10% is essentially a 7% pay cut. The offer felt particularly callous as we moved out of the pandemic, where the labours of staff had been absolutely extraordinary, and the subject of near-universal internal and external praise. Members of all three trade unions voted to enter a formal dispute with the College in September 2022. Sadly, this dispute has not been resolved, and the problem has only become more pronounced.

Imperial is one of the wealthiest universities in the UK and can easily afford to protect its staff pay against the steep rises in the cost of living.  In this year’s pay award cycle, the JTU put in a pay claim of 10.5% – an amount which we clearly show is affordable by the College, and is only attempting to protect the value of staff pay against the current inflation rate.

Alas, Imperial is now imposing a pay award of 5.2% for this year, which, for the second year in a row, is going to make College staff significantly poorer in real terms.

Nobody wants industrial action. But the staff at Imperial College recognise that management are simply not listening to arguments based on logic and compassion. They are role playing in one of the worst aspects of end-stage capitalism and modern business development, viz. the marketisation of higher education, where staff are treated as a cost to be managed. We are in a position where we feel the only way management will listen is by the credible, and legal, threat of withdrawing our labour via forms of strike action.

Members of all three trade unions have voted for strike action over a shared dispute, for the first time in Imperial College’s rich and varied history.

The UCU have commenced their marking and assessment boycott (MAB) and there are 5 days of strike action declared during this term.

If we do not do this, the College will continue to erode the value of pay and conditions at Imperial. And we are not just doing this for to protect our pay this year, but for the more global and fundamental purpose of protecting our university from becoming yet another business, and ensuring the profession is one that aspiring academics will still want to join. This affects us all.

You can help by emailing the President and Provost of Imperial College and asking them to pay their staff fairly.

UCU and Unite members on the picket line, May 2023

We are grateful to Jonathan Pinto & Roddy Slorach for representing the branch at this meeting on 19/4/2. Full conference information cab be found here and our delegates’ reports with full voting records are below.

JP_SHESC_April_2023_report RS_SHESC_April_2023_report

Imperial UCU were concerned that Professor Peter Haynes, the Vice Provost (Education & Student Experience)’s message to students regarding the ongoing industrial action contained some misleading and inaccurate statement. Herewith the rebuttal to Professor Haynes’ message, as sent to student members of the UCU:

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Solidarity action: Imperial Events Meeting cancelled (28 February 2023)

UCU Imperial branch is grateful to the distinguished journalist, author and broadcaster, Kenan Malik, who has withdrawn from an Events Meeting on Tuesday 28th February organised by the College, in solidarity with our strike action demanding an improved pay offer for all staff at Imperial. The meeting was originally organised to discuss his latest book Not So Black and White on race, class, and identity politics. However, he withdrew in support of our dispute over pensions, pay and working conditions in higher education, when it became apparent the meeting fell on a strike day in our dispute over local pay.

As Kenan said: “I don’t cross picket lines, and I support the strikes”.

We have our AGM at 12 noon on Thursday 14th July, and nominations are open for branch officers, Please use the below document and submit nominations to ucu-office@imperial.ac.uk by Thursday 16th June.

Imperial UCU branch position nomination form 2022 2023

Annual Congress is the supreme decision-making body of our union. It comprises two sections: a two-day conference bringing together all the post-16 education sectors of the union, and a one-day conference for each of the FE and HE sectors.

Congress 2022 took place online but voting this year took place live via a platform provided by Civica (the same organisation which organises industrial action ballots). This change was widely welcomed, but it did take time for votes to be recorded and the results announced. As a result, a large number of motions were not discussed, including the whole section on Education.

The full text of all motions can be found here. Many passed without opposition. This report will focus on the key motions, including those which were contested.

Congress Day 1

Motion 5 on Proportional Representation passed by a large majority, as did Motion 13 on making subs rates more progressive, and Motions 15 and 16, which made changes concerning the regulation of members’ conduct.  Motion 17 formalised the move to real time voting at conferences.

Two motions focused on the General Secretary’s (GS) role in the ongoing UK-wide disputes over the Four Fights and USS pensions. Motion 19 censuring the GS over the conduct of these disputes, was narrowly defeated. Motion L1 (‘L’ depicts a ‘late’ motion) – less explicitly critical of the GS – won by a narrow majority.

HE Sector Conference (USS and Four Fights disputes)

Motion HE3, re failures in USS governance, was passed by a substantial majority.

HE6, a detailed motion outlining a strategy for effective industrial action in the HE disputes, was carried by a small majority.  As amended, this commits the union to an aggregated UK-wide industrial action ballot over the USS and Four Fights disputes beginning as soon as possible this month and running until September.

HE7 and HE8, respectively requiring weekly ‘Get The Vote Out’ branch updates from Civica for this ballot and that this ballot should be in aggregated form, were also passed, in both cases with a larger majority.

HE10 and HE11 both focused on the democratic conduct of disputes, stressing the need for Branch Delegate Meetings (BDMs) to take place prior to HE Committee (HEC) decisions on industrial action, and that HEC should take full account of votes at BDMs.

Another late motion, L7, highlighted and promoted the ‘Twin to win’ campaign. This concerns a group of branches which secured a mandate in the last ballot on Four Fights and USS and have over recent weeks carried out a (remarkably successful) marking and assessment boycott aimed at keeping the dispute active until the next UK-wide steps have been arranged.

L8, criticising delays to industrial action, was passed by a large majority.

Congress Day 2

Congress saw considerable debate over a group of Equalities motions concerning different aspects of rights for trans people. Motion 38, the focus of some controversy in this branch and elsewhere prior to Congress, was stripped of sections (a) and (c) by the Congress Business Committee following legal advice. This and the other motions in this group were subsequently passed with similarly large majorities.

One rule change was agreed by the required two-thirds majority at Congress. Motion 55 will mean that smaller UCU branches will be better represented at future conferences. Motion 57 committed the union to establishing a branch delegate-based industrial action committee to run industrial action. Although passed, Motion 57 did not secure a two-thirds majority so therefore fell.

As Imperial UCU’s only delegate at Congress, I voted in favour of all the motions outlined above, including those calling for an aggregated ballot, and Motion 19, which was lost.

All other motions were remitted to the National Executive Committee.

I will present a report to at the next Imperial UCU members’ meeting on Wednesday 15th June about the decisions of Congress and HESC and will be happy to answer any questions.

Roddy Slorach, June 2022

Text of an emergency motion passed regarding ASOS in the upcoming USS dispute at an Imperial UCU all members meeting on 24/11/21:

Imperial UCU notes that 

• UCU branches which passed the threshold have a mandate for all the elements of ASOS listed on the ballot paper
• UCU notifications of action to employers cite only work-to-contract and refusal of voluntary duties
• UCEA has advised institutions that refusing to reschedule classes or cover for absent colleagues are not covered by the notification.

Imperial UCU believes that 

• No HEC decision dictated the content of the notifications
• This situation potentially undermines our industrial action.

Imperial UCU calls on the General Secretary and HEC to immediately rectify the situation by issuing corrected notifications of action to the employers.

Message for all Imperial College staff from branch UCU, 25/11/21

Dear Colleagues,

The Provost, Ian Walmsley, emailed all staff last Wednesday about next week’s industrial action by the University and College Union (UCU) over cuts to USS pensions. Vice-Provost (Education & Student Experience), Emma McCoy, also sent a separate email about the action to all students.

UCU officially represents all staff in USS who are about to see very significant cuts, on average more than 20%, to their pension imposed by the College. I am therefore writing to tell you why UCU believes industrial action is necessary.

First some background: UCU, together with Unison and Unite, negotiate the pay settlement for all staff, not just our members, every year. We also represent all staff in many workplace matters including policies over bullying and harassment, health and safety issues, precarious jobs, nursery fees, compulsory lecture capture as well as tackling gender and ethnic pay gaps. With almost no staff representation within senior management and governance bodies compared to our peer institutions, UCU plays a vital role in challenging the democratic deficit at Imperial. If you want your voice heard more clearly and are not a member of UCU, please consider joining us!

Back to pensions, these should be considered as deferred pay and a cut to pensions simply represents a cut to pay. Every member of staff needs to ask: what would I do if College threatened to cut my pay?

The first step would be to ask why such a cut was necessary. On this issue at least management and the unions agree:  as the email to students stated: “For several years, UK universities and trade unions have disagreed with the valuation placed upon the Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS).” For example, the risk that USS might not be able to pay our pensions is based on assuming that it underperforms compared to any 30-year investment period since 1900. That’s worse than over the 30 years that includes the first World War, the Spanish Flu epidemic and the Great Depression!

The second step would be to understand the effect of the cuts. I urge you to find out how this will affect you personally using either the UCU modeller https://www.ucu.org.uk/ussmodeller or the USS modeller  https://www.ussconsultation2021.co.uk/members/impact; with the latter, you can include the effect of the 2.5% inflation cap based on the historical average rate of inflation of 3.5%. Both modellers show that the cuts are worse for younger staff, in part because the eroding effect of this cap.  For example, a typical 37-year-old academic would experience a cut of between 23-35%.

The third step would be to challenge management’s response.  Rather than try to force a new valuation, Universities UK (UUK) have imposed nearly all of the burden onto staff. UCU has proposed alternative short-term proposals for a more balanced sharing of the cost of the 2020 valuation, while a long-term plan for USS is established on a more credible footing. Imperial management must take the lead and publicly call for these alternative proposals to be explored, for the sake of the staff that they claim to value.  Instead, rather than work with UCU in retrieving the pension they say that they value, management have attempted to drive a wedge between the staff and the students that we teach and support. On that score, students have good reason to be sceptical of the claim that “funds will be reinvested to directly benefit students and your education.” UCU has previously requested that pay withheld from striking staff be paid into the student hardship fund, but this request has been refused.

We now believe that the only path open to us to defend our pensions is to take industrial action. We do not want to disrupt the education of our students: we are the ones who know, teach, and support them. But the responsibility for the disruption lies fully with our employers. We are taking this action on behalf of all staff at lmperial, particularly our younger and future colleagues, many of them currently our students, who will lose the most. I urge you to join us, join UCU and support the action necessary to defend our pensions.

Vijay Tymms, President Imperial UCU

On behalf of Imperial UCU Branch

Text of two motions passed at an Imperial UCU all members’ meeting on 29/9/21:

Motion 1 on COVID-19 safety at Imperial College

Imperial College UCU notes that:

• the UK currently has over 30,000 new cases of COVID-19 daily and fatality rates over a thousand per week. These are much higher than in comparable nearby countries
• Vaccination significantly reduces the risk of death but the risk of infection far less. As the virus is airborne, masks are effective in preventing transmission.
• current College policy is that “everyone [should] wear a face covering [in] most indoor settings on campus”. However, visible signage to this effect has been removed in most campus locations.
• current DfE guidance states, “No student should be denied education on the grounds of whether they are, or are not, wearing a face covering.” However, staff are partially liable under health and safety law for their own and students’ safety. They have the right to suspend a face-to-face class and deliver it online if alternatives are unsafe. Denying a student education is not the same as denying participation in a face-to-face setting if the latter would be unsafe.

Imperial College UCU believes that:

• rising UK infection rates show that government guidelines have failed to protect UK residents
• Imperial College remains a hazardous environment for both staff and students.

Imperial College UCU believes the following protections must be in place before face-to-face teaching can resume:

• masks to be required in all indoor areas for all those who can wear them, and in all cramped, crowded, poorly ventilated outdoor areas (eg, South Ken walkway, entrance to Beit Quad)
• physical distancing to be maintained at 2m
• room occupancy to be based on 12 – 17 L pp ps ventilation AND CO2 <800 ppm measured by real time CO2 monitors provided by College, with immediate evacuation if CO2 levels reach 800ppm
• for prolonged occupation of rooms, refresh times to be calculated for removal of aerosols and measured return of CO2 to background level (~ 400-440 ppm). Speed of aerosol removal will depend on the rate of air circulation. A solid evidence base for this must be established
• room occupancy limits for teaching to be the same for other activities, whichever is lower
• radio microphones to be provided to individual teachers
• no staff or student to undertake face-to-face activities if they feel unsafe; no action to be taken against such staff or students
• teaching to maintain a level academic playing field. This may require default online teaching to avoid discrimination against protected groups unable to come onto campus
• all measures to be equalities impact assessed before implementation
• all risk assessments to be transparent and made available to staff and students

These measures will be subject to review and amendment in the event of new variants or new lockdowns.

We believe that failure to implement these measures would be a failure of the College in its duty of care to staff and students, leading to potential future legal action against both the College and those individuals who have signed off on inadequate risk assessments

Under Section 44 of the Employment Relations Act, staff have the right to remove themselves from a work situation they believe to be a serious, imminent and unavoidable danger without detriment or penalty.

Motion 2 on COVID-19 and flexible working at Imperial College

Imperial College UCU would like to be supported on staff flexible working arrangements during academic year 2021-2022 in the following manner

1. Any Imperial staff member should be given the option to continue working from home if their roles do not need them to physically be in an office or lecture room and other alternatives are feasible to meet their job duties
2. Any member who has been asked to return to campus for certain number of days should have the option to decline it, if they can work remotely and their performance is not affected by not being physically on campus
3. Managers should work with their staff to allow flexibility on when to be on campus.
4. Personal and travel arrangements should be considered with the safety of staff being a priority.
5. Imperial staff should be supported if they choose to work from campus whenever they like provided they follow suitable health and safety procedures
6. All imperial staff who are carers, vulnerable or have been shielding in the last 18 months should be given the opportunity to work from home if they like until further notice without any negative consequences

These proposals are subject to review and amendment depending on changed circumstances such as the emergence of a new variant or new lockdowns.