NEC Meeting last Friday

Last Friday’s NEC met to discuss what action to take in the light of the membership consultation.

1.       UCU had an overwhelming vote of over 80% (of those who voted) supporting the NEC’s rejection of the government’s pension proposals and in favour of a continuing campaign against them. 60% of those who voted also supported striking on March 28^th alongside other unions. The PCS, NUT and EIS all got broadly similar results from their consultations.

2.       The NUT Executive last Wednesday decided against a national strike on the 28^th but instead decided to bring out its members in London as the start of a campaign of rolling strike action. The EIS Exec. then decided not to strike on the 28^th. The PCS Exec. does not meet until today.

3.       We had to consider both what our members had voted FOR and what other unions were planning to do. We decided therefore to:

A)     Tell the PCS that UCU will endorse national strike on the 28^th March if the PCS does as well.

B)      Endorse UCU strike action in London on the 28^th alongside the NUT. With dinnertime protests nationally outside other colleges.

C)      Instruct the general secretary to talk to other unions urgently to agree a programme of action for after Easter.

4.       I’ll send out further details tomorrow when I hear the PCS decision. It strikes me, however, if it is the case that the PCS does not strike on the 28^th and we just have a London only strike on that day then one concrete way of making the day as national as possible will be for Yorkshire UCU branches to ‘twin’ with London UCU branches – that can mean collecting money to pay for picketers’ breakfasts, messages of support, linking up at department level etc. We must not let our London members feel they are being asked to fight for all of us on their own. So we also need to demand that there is a rolling programme of regional action to follow.