In an email circulated to students at the end of last week by management the following assertion was made about the negotiations with UCU and the other unions. In the email management claim:
“These consultations have resulted in substantial changes to the
University’s proposals.”
We beg to differ, and would like to point out that:
- a reduction from 115 to (now) 112 redundancies (5 were added last week) is not substantial (and some of the reduction is because people have already left in the normal course of events…)
- The School plans are barely changed (the largest change, the teaching-out provision in Life Sciences and Informatics, is an inevitable requirement and doesn’t change the underlying proposal).
- History is still cutting areas of pre-1900 European and pre-1700 English history.
- Staff in English are still facing redundancy because of what they used to teach.
- The student adviser roles are still all going.
- The UNISEX service is still under threat.
- The creche is still under threat.
- Jobs are still going in IT Services.
- 5 out of 6 of the UCU executive are still at risk of redundancy.
Yes, there have been modest improvements in some of the mechanisms being used to get rid of 112 staff, but that’s not substantial (and indeed not adequate). Nor is it a change to the ‘proposal’.
We do not take strike action lightly, and when many of us will be out of work later this year giving up pay is the last thing we want to do. We’ve been left with little choice in face of the intransigence of management who continue to spend 10s of millions on buildings while ignoring the voice of staff and students.
The picket lines will be up from 7.00am. The day ends with a march and rally in Brighton.
As a student at Sussex, I was annoyed at the management email sent out to students. It’s the management who are holding our education hostage, not the staff. In solidarity