In Praise of Unions - They Can Win

If there was ever proof that disciplined and strategically rational Union action can and will win, look no further than the Universities Union. They achieved their objectives, they let the opposition tie itself in knots, and ended up with exactly what they had planned all along. 

It was a costly battle for the other side. It was a win-win for the union. They ended up richer than they were before due to the strategic incompetence of the other side. Union Organisers of yesteryear would be proud...

... or not. 

The Union I am referring to is UCEA (not UCU). UCEA is the Universities and Colleges Employers Association. Call it what it is – a Union and a very successful one at the moment. If it is not a Union, then perhaps it could be called a price fixing organisation. Union fits better and as a group, they fought UCU to a standstill. To my view, they gave only what they intended and nothing more. Actually, they did not even fight. They just waited while the other side self-destructed.

A rough synopsis is that the employers offered a 1% pay raise for the year. This is below current inflation, follows many years of below inflation pay raises and is well below the average rise in pay of Vice Chancellors (VCs). How could this be defended in the face of rising University incomes and surpluses? 

The Union considered this, balloted its membership on strike action and action short of a strike. Both were given a go-ahead. A work to contract was declared, a series of strike days followed together with a set of 2 hour strikes. The employers did not budge as far as I could tell and a subset of Universities took a hard line that deducted a whole days pay for a 2 hour strike, including hours worked before the strike commenced. In my opinion the latter is clear wage theft. There was a profound lack of any serious help from UCU on what should be done to recover this.

Academics have noticed that employers do not worry too much about strike days. The reason is the Academic mentality: we always do the work somehow. Students don’t leave the year missing, for example, the concept of x-rays because of a strike day. We always mark everything in the end and we try to help our students. Most of us chose to be academics because we love knowledge and learning and teaching and finding out new things.  We still do these things while out on the picket lines, taking a shower in the morning, or walking the dog.  Academics have also noticed that against this backdrop, strikes only enrich employers. Because of this, strike discipline was pretty appalling and got worse.

So the Union put its last option on the table, a marking boycott was to begin on a particular date in late April which would continue until, well whenever, ...  for us it would have been at least until mid-June. The employers (at least mine) made clear that refusing to mark would be a breach of contract and pay would be deducted from the time the boycott started. As disgusting as the deduction of pay from before a strike began by the UCEA militants, on the point relating to a marking boycott, I agree with the Universities on their position. If I decided to boycott lecturing or supervising labs, it would be perfectly within my Employer’s rights to decide I was not fulfilling my contract from the time I started the boycott to the time I stopped. 

Even the most militant Union members realised a marking boycott was a very costly proposition and if followed to the letter would result in loss of a month or more in pay. It was unlikely to happen in a disciplined manner and staff on tight budgets would not be able to afford it. That is pretty much where the fight ended.

Despite this, I think the Employers were a little nervous about the marking boycott. Negotiations took place close to the date the boycott was supposed to begin and UCEA came back with a masterful last minute gambit: they offered a 1% pay raise for this year (no change in offer) AND "sweetened" it with a 2% raise (probably what they would have offered anyway) for next year. This was sufficient to result in a ballot of UCU members, which voted overwhelmingly to call off the marking boycott. Game over.

So that is how you snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. A very just campaign to improve pay in the face of long term loss of real wages to inflation against the backdrop of large real average pay increases awarded to VCs was lost through tactical incompetence. It also puts the lid on any pay increases for probably another two years.

I am sure UCU will try to put the best face on this, but they were outgunned by a more disciplined and strategically competent Union. Simple as that.