Northumbria University staff announce ten more days of strike action
Staff at a Newcastle university have announced further strike action.
The action, which initially took place over February, will continue over a further ten days in April.
Represented by the UCU (University and College Union) staff claim pay and pensions are being “stolen”.
The dispute centres on the university telling workers to switch to a different pension scheme or potentially have their pay frozen, the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) said.
The LDRS added university managers want to save £11 million per year by having staff switch pension schemes, which the lecturers’ union has claimed could leave employees significantly worse off.
The new strike dates will run over 16, 17, 25, 26, 27 March, and 20-24 April.
UCU branch chair and English lecturer Adam Hansen told the Local Democracy Reporting Service on Tuesday that the strike was a “last resort” and that union members “are saying they want to carry on the action, reluctantly but necessarily”.
The university said on Tuesday that it would continue to meet with the UCU but that “doing nothing to address these costs [of the TPS] is not an option”.
A spokesperson added: “We are disappointed that further dates for industrial action have been announced before we have been able to engage further, and that they continue to refer to pay freezes when our proposal was clear that we would look at what may be affordable.
“We will do all we can to protect the educational experience of our students while a minority of UCU members, representing a small proportion of all of our academic colleagues, participate in this action.”
A ‘stop the steal’ petition, set up by the union, currently has over 1,400 supporters.