Criticism mounts over proposed changes to university pensions

The University and College Union (UCU) and the University of Oxford have criticised proposed changes to the principal pension scheme for academic and academically-related staff in UK universities. A UCU strike ballot on the issue closes on Monday.

UCU warned last week that changes proposed to the Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS) by Universities UK (UUK) risk creating a two-tier system penalising staff at older universities, including some of the UK’s most highly ranked.

Oxford, the university with the most USS members, claimed yesterday that UUK figures underestimate the scale of the cuts to staff pensions the proposed changes would have.

Universities UK has set out plans to reform the USS by axing its final salary section in light of a deficit, currently estimated at £8bn.

For future service, all USS members would continue to receive career revalued benefits on their salary up to the proposed threshold of £50,000 a year provided that the cost is affordable for employers.

Benefits on earnings above the proposed threshold would be provided in a new defined contribution section.

According to the Times Higher Education, a working party set up by Oxford warned that UUK figures illustrating the difference between the current USS and UUK’s proposals are “misleading because they assume no promotion or incremental salary increases over time.”

It claims that examples based on a realistic and typical career “would show a much greater reduction of benefits to the average academic member of staff than is shown in the UUK.”

UCU, which is currently balloting members in Oxford, Warwick and 67 other universities for industrial action in response to UUK’s plans, have published figures showing that staff in the USS could be up to almost £20,000 worse off per year in retirement than their colleagues in a different scheme at newer, post-1992 universities, should the changes go through.

The majority of staff at pre-1992 universities, including all but one of the Russell Group, are in the USS.

The changes could therefore see staff at the UK’s most highly-ranked universities receiving significantly smaller annual pensions than staff at some lower-ranked universities, including Oxford Brookes and Anglia Ruskin.

Staff at Warwick and Birmingham Universities could also receive less in retirement than their counterparts at other universities in Birmingham.

UCU general secretary Sally Hunt warned: “Once prospective staff know that pensions at some our most famous universities are up to 36% lower than the new universities, there will be real concerns about recruitment and retention of the brightest talent.”

When asked whether Warwick is concerned about the proposed changes in terms of recruiting and retaining staff, University spokesman Peter Dunn replied: “Like all universities Warwick wants to see a sustainable and attractive pension scheme in place at the conclusion of the current debate.”

He also commented that Warwick has passed on the full range of its own staff views and feedback to UUK and has no institutional view on Oxford’s comments.

The USS Joint Negotiating Committee, which comprises equal representatives from UCU and UUK and an independent chair, will meet for the first time to discuss the proposed changes on October 22.

UCU Head of press, Dan Ashley told the Boar that the union is balloting its members before going into talks with UUK because it would be “impossible” for UCU to respond if the talks failed without a ballot having taken place.