Lecturers strike out over pensions as seminars and lectures cancelled

Lecturers and tutors at Warwick University went on strike on Thursday, protesting against planned changes to the Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS), the pension scheme for employees in higher education. The strike was organised by the University and College Union (UCU).

Throughout Thursday morning many lecturers and supportive students set up picket lines at Gibbet Hill Campus and the Gatehouse on University Road, displaying the slogans “hands off our pensions” and “fair pensions for all.” Many lectures and seminars were abandoned across campus, as academics stayed at home to show their objection to the pension plans.

The protest at the Gatehouse attracted almost 30 academics, and another 25 stood at the picket lines at Gibbet Hill. The exact number of strikers will not be confirmed until April, when the University will deduct 1/260th of an academic’s year salary for each day of protest, funds which will then be spent to create new student bursaries and support packages.

The planned changes to the USS involve a higher age at which members receive the pension (65 rather than 60, or 63.5), and the payment of a higher rate of contributions by employees (7.5 percent instead of 6.35). According to the Employers Pension Forum (EPF), the changes are an attempt to allow the USS to “remain sustainable, attractive and affordable for all: employers and members, current and future.”

This opinion is not shared by the UCU or many members of the scheme, with Lenny Shail, a student who joined the lecturers at the picket lines, arguing that the changes are “blind robbery, making people pay more money for less cover, for a shorter period of time.”

With current members purportedly losing up to £150,000 and new members up to £461,000 in contributions and reduced payments, it was argued by many UCU-affiliated academics that support from Warwick students was vital for the strike to be a success.

Dr Jonathon Davies, a senior History lecturer and member of the Warwick UCU Committee, told the Boar that he hoped “students will understand how this attack on staff pensions will deter the best people from working at universities including Warwick, and that the quality of teaching will decline as a result.”

Many students joined the lecturers on the picket lines, including Aidan Barlow, a member of the Socialist Worker Student Society, who argued that “it’s important for students to send a message of solidarity, just as the academics supported student fees protest… We should be able to afford to provide everyone a decent standard of living, and a good pension is an important part of that.”

Aidan Hocking, another undergraduate attendee at the picket lines, commented that “at a time the entire public sector is under attack by the Coalition, is it really necessary to be undermining their private pension agreements which are financially viable?”

There appears to be much contention between the employees at the University on this issue, with the University represented at a national level on both the UCU and the EPF, the forum that is responsible for the changes. Dr Kevin Purdy, of the School of Life Sciences, argued that the private-sector USS “does not receive a penny of tax-payers money” and is “not yet a mature pension scheme, as there is still far more money being paid into the scheme than leaving it… [the EPF] are just using the economic climate as an excuse to justify cutting pay.”

Lecturers who remained at work, however, stressed the strike’s impact on students as unacceptable for the chances of success, with phD student and seminar tutor David Beck arguing that “the strikes are not representing the interests of students… the lecturers can’t be arguing about the cuts in education budgets as well as grab a bigger slice of the pie.”

The University was keen to stress that many employees continued their duties as normal, and it seems unlikely that the figure of 700 striking lecturers (mentioned in the Coventry Telegraph) was accurate; according to Peter Dunn, the University’s Press Officer, the main priority was to “ensure the maximum possible continuity of University teaching during the strike.”

Thursday’s strike aimed to convince the Employers Pension Forum to take the dispute to the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service (ACAS), an independent body that the UCU claims could help solve the dispute. The strike will be followed by similar demonstrations at over sixty other U.K. universities, with a nationwide demonstration on Thursday 24 March.

If no such attempts are successful, the next step by members of the UCU will be what are known as ‘actions short of strike,’ involving the persistent neglect of duties such as marking students’ coursework and administering examinations.

While many students could consider such actions extreme, the President of Warwick UCU, Vin Hammersley, concluded that “the USS is a not a fat cat pension scheme, it is sensible and reasonable. Academics are not like bankers, and don’t already earn huge salaries.”