Following a vote by our well attended January General meeting, on Tuesday 21st members received a message from UCU asking them to vote in an online local Consultative Ballot over avoiding compulsory redundancies at the University of Sheffield. The branch committee, and our local dispute committee, are asking members to vote YES on all questions in this ballot.
In the Autumn, University management announced an intention to cut staff costs by £23 million over the course of two academic years. As part of this, an additional set of restructures – on top of the at least 21 that they are already planning as part of the highly unpopular New Schools plan – has been announced. This amounts to more disruption and risk to jobs in a single year than this University has seen in a decade.
In December 2024, this branch launched a local grievance with our employer over these issues, alongside UoS Unite. In January, two local negotiating meetings took place in an attempt to resolve the dispute, and as of our second meeting, management were not willing to commit to no compulsory redundancies, nor to substantially reducing their target for staff cuts.
It is the branch’s view that:
- management have not adequately demonstrated the financial need to pursue such aggressive levels of cuts;
- management’s stated timeline of returning to a surplus position within the short timeframe of two years is unnecessary;
- management have still not fully explored non-staff alternatives, including comprehensively reviewing the amount of money paid to third party vendors (including management consultancies, private security firms, and IT consultancies), or how this could be reduced to save jobs and/or bring work in-house;
- management have not full explored all options within the staffing budget, such as reduced hours, voluntary unpaid leave, or re-opening the VS scheme;
- management have not adequately explained why UEB salaries should remain at their current level, rather than being reduced to save jobs, nor have they committed to forgoing their bonuses until the university returns to a surplus position;
- management’s transparency and openness regarding the university’s financial position needs to improve, in order to build staff trust.
We believe that the current proposals can still be significantly improved through meaningful negotiation, and welcome continued talks with management to resolve this dispute. The ballot received by members is consultative and designed to gauge the views of the branch. A YES vote does not mean we would immediately call industrial action; if support is strong, we will declare a trade dispute, and move to a formal ballot locally. At this point, the branch will seek to build consensus on precisely what forms and patterns of ASOS and strike action a) are likely to be most impactful and b) members are willing to engage in. As this would be a local dispute, members of this branch would have ultimate say on these points.