Industrial action, November 2022 - September 2023

Summary of the action

The national dispute saw strike action undertaken by UCU in the Autumn term on 24, 25 and 30 November 2022.

Strike action then took place on the following dates in Spring term 2023: 

• Wednesday 1 February
• Thursday 9 and Friday 10 February 
• Tuesday 14, Wednesday 15 and Thursday 16 February 
• Wednesday 15, Thursday 16 and Friday 17 March 
• Monday 20, Tuesday 21 and Wednesday 22 March

Action short of a strike began on 20 April 2023 and included a marking and assessment boycott. This saw some marks not being returned in academic year 2022-23, which made it challenging to provide results for a number of students.

Agreement sees local strike action called off

Strike action did not take place at Goldsmiths at the beginning of Autumn term 2023, after the College and local branch of UCU reached agreement over a range of issues put forward for negotiation by the union.

This means Welcome activities went ahead as planned. 

The agreement included repayment of half of deductions made in relation to the marking and assessment boycott for action taken in June 2023, and cancelling planned deductions for action taken in August 2023.

In addition to this, the College made commitments over gender and ethnicity pay inequality and additional support for families. The full details of the agreement are published below.

The agreement was reached after GUCU members passed an emergency motion at a meeting on 20 September 2023. This was after central UCU gave permission for local branches to enter negotiations with employers over local resolutions national strike action planned for 25-29 September 2023.

Commitments from the College

• Repay one half of the deduction from salary for participation in the MAB for the one week in June (salary deducted in August, repayment would be in the October or November payroll)
• Cancel the deduction from salary for participation in the MAB for the one week in August (salary due to be deducted in October)
• A contribution of 20% of all reasonable childcare costs for Goldsmiths staff, including casualised workers and funded students (commencing academic year 24/25)
• The removal of completion/continuation fees for PhD students (commencing academic year 24/25)
• Work towards eliminating the gender and ethnicity pay gaps on a phased basis. The College would hope to achieve this within three years – however, as yet the gap has not been costed and a detailed action plan would need to be worked out and agreed. This would be included in the People Plan and the College overarching ten-year strategy

National negotiations - update from April 2023

Negotiations over the disputes are held on a national basis, between representative groups for universities and UCU and other higher education staff unions including UNISON. 

In the dispute over pay and working conditions, universities including Goldsmiths are represented by UCEA. 

In the dispute over pensions, universities including Goldsmiths are represented by Universities UK. 

On pay, an uplift of between 8% and 5% has been awarded to staff. While this is not recognised by the unions, part of the award was implemented early to help university staff during the cost of living crisis and was back-dated to 1 February 2023. 

On working conditions, UCEA has made a commitment over a review of the UK HE pay spine, workload, contract types and equality pay gaps. This has been rejected in a consultation of UCU members. 

On pensions, an offer has been made to restore benefits for members who belong to the USS pension. Following consultation, UCU members have agreed to note this offer which allows industrial action relating to this dispute to be set aside while talks continue.

Goldsmiths’ position on the issues

This is a national dispute between UCU and the sector as a whole rather than individual universities. However, the position of individual institutions is important.

Goldsmiths believe our staff deserve the best pay and pensions we can afford and the best working conditions we can provide. Unlike some other universities, we have never been a wealthy institution and we invest any surplus in supporting the student experience, teaching and the creation of new knowledge.

Unfortunately, the pandemic and central government cuts put considerable extra pressure on our finances. We had to make some difficult decisions to put us back onto a stable financial footing, with a Recovery Programme in place to help guarantee our future and to make £9m in ongoing savings by the end of financial year 2022-23.

Employment facts about Goldsmiths

• Average mean salary for a full-time, permanent Goldsmiths employee: £47,262, above the average London wage based on Office for National Statistics data
• The College contributes £12 million a year to staff pensions, including to a defined benefit scheme still open to new members
• Up to 28 annual days’ leave every year, plus six closure days as well as Bank Holidays
• Three-quarters of our academic staff are permanent
• We do not use zero-hours contracts
• Part of national pay agreements
• At 6.4% our median gender pay gap (2022) is below the university sector average of 8.5% and we are working towards pay equality
• Our median ethnicity pay gap (2021) is 16.4%. We recognise this is not good enough and are putting in place actions to directly address this and the underlying issues behind such inequality
• Goldsmiths has committed to paying at least the London Living Wage since 2011
• The College responded to student and staff campaigns by bringing cleaning and security colleagues in-house
• We provide free confidential, 24/7 access to a Staff Assistance Programme, Staff Counsellor and also offer a wide range of wellbeing support
• We are working on a number of initiatives to support staff and students with the current cost of living crisis, including putting an additional £100k in the student hardship fund

Pay

Goldsmiths spent some £90.4 million on staff costs in academic year 2020-21, the latest year for which audited accounts are available. This £90.4 million accounts for 72% of our overall income and is by far our biggest outgoing.

Of this, the main contributions are accounted for with £66.1 million on salaries with £12.1 million on employer pension contributions and £6.4 million on social security costs.

Every year universities use what is called collective bargaining to help decide how much pay rises will be across the sector.

Collective bargaining is a way to make sure pay rises are equal across higher education. It sees a group called UCEA represent universities in negotiations with UCU over levels of pay.

This year, lower-paid staff will receive a 9% pay-rise with the remainder getting a 3% pay-rise.

Financial volatility including high inflation has led to UCU rejecting this pay offer. Despite the best efforts of both sides a compromise has not been reached as yet, leading to UCU balloting its members for industrial action over pay.

Pensions

Goldsmiths invested £12.1 million to staff pensions in the last year, with £10 million of this in contributions to the Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS) which is the main pension scheme in the UK university sector.

The USS is the largest private pension scheme in the UK, meaning it is not like the pension for state school teachers which is guaranteed by public money.

Instead, the USS relies on a multi-billion pound funding pot to ensure that the pensions promises made to members of the scheme can be paid now and in the future.

Recent financial volatility means there have been concerns over the levels of funding for the scheme, with a financial health check showing a shortfall of £14billion between the level of funding and the pensions commitments made to members.

As a result of this, changes were made to the scheme to ensure it remained sustainable. Unfortunately, in exchange for helping secure the future of the scheme the changes mean that members now receive lower benefits than before.

The valuable defined benefit element has been kept – defined benefit pensions are considered the gold-standard of retirement savings with a guaranteed income. The USS is one of the few pensions schemes in the UK to have a defined benefit element which is still open to new members joining the scheme.

Recent movement in global and national finances, including higher interest rates, has seen the funding position of the scheme improve. This has led to calls to reverse the recent changes but there are still concerns over how ongoing financial instability could further impact the scheme.

Goldsmiths has always said that the door should be left open to reversing the changes, should the funding position improve on a sustained basis. See our USS consultation response 21 May 2021 (PDF).

Decisions over the USS pension are made on a sector-wide basis, as with pay, with Universities UK representing universities in discussions with UCU.

Working conditions

Goldsmiths has a clear set of values with social and racial justice and equity key to us as an institution and for our community of students and staff. We work hard to put these values into action as an employer.

We do not use zero-hour contracts and the number of academic staff who have permanent contracts is above figures released nationally by UCU. In addition to this, we offer generous general working terms especially when compared to private sector allowance – with significant annual leave allowance and we are a London Living Wage employer.

We recognise that gender and ethnicity pay disparities are not good enough and we are working hard to address these issues.