Our strike notification has now been submitted. Industrial action will begin in Week 8 (17 November 2025) and continue for 4 weeks, in line with the pattern in the motion passed by a branch meeting last month. We have given notification for the following dates of strike action:
Week 1: 17, 18, 19, and 21 November 2025
Week 2: 24, 25, 26, and 27 November 2025
Week 3: 1, 2, 4, and 5 December 2025
Week 4: 9, 10, 11, and 12 December 2025
Action short of a strike has also been notified starting on 17 November 2025, including the following actions:
not covering for absent colleagues, vacant posts, or posts that are discontinued due to change management;
not rescheduling lectures or classes cancelled as a result of strike action;
not sharing materials relating to lectures or classes cancelled as a result of strike action;
not undertaking any voluntary activities;
not undertaking duties which are not commensurate with the grade of the post;
not using personal devices to conduct work.
We are dedicated to using the time between now and the commencement of possible strike action to focus on negotiating a satisfactory resolution to the dispute. Although negotiations thus far have not yet led to a resolution, they have been productive. Our branch’s strong membership and our live industrial action mandate have materially helped these negotiations, and we thank members for your work in the GTVO and in organising.
We will provide full details about strike arrangements, including financial support, strike drop-ins, and other practical information later this week (week commencing 20/10/2025).
Industrial Action Ballot Outcome and Next Steps
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We have received confirmation that members have voted overwhelmingly for strike action (76.9% Yes) and action short of a strike (82.3% Yes) in our ballot for industrial action. The turnout was 52.6%.
This mandate demonstrates a strong commitment from our members to resist management’s ongoing campaign of job cuts and the threat to staff workload and wellbeing that they represent.
Thank you to all members who voted and helped organise during this ballot, particularly given that at the end of summer many people are taking leave or working off campus, which introduces challenges to getting the vote out (GTVO). Our negotiators are continuing to meet with management, and we hope that this strong mandate encourages management to make an offer that will avert the need to take this strike action. Any decision on whether to take such an offer would need to be taken by the branch collectively in a general meeting, in accordance with a motion passed last year.
Join us at our EGM this Thursday (2nd October at 1pm), where we will discuss how to use this mandate for action most effectively to protect jobs and fight back against the worsening of our workloads and working conditions.
More threats to jobs, no long term vision. Vote YES to industrial action
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At this point last year, the Vice-Chancellor was claiming that UEB’s approach to reducing staff expenditure over two academic years would allow the University to return to a surplus position by the 2026/27 academic year. Despite the announced savings target of £23m having already been nearly achieved in a single academic year, the Vice-Chancellor then announced in Spring 2025 that more targeted staff cuts and uncertainty were necessary, and a set of five academic schools would face review and a targeted voluntary severance (VS) scheme starting this Autumn. Suddenly, 27/28 was the new target year to return to surplus.
Earlier today, staff in five additional work areas were told they face targeted VS, and are potentially at risk of undergoing a review and then restructure. This decision, and the meagre justifications that UEB are offering, show a complete lack of leadership or financial strategy.
The five work areas are as follows:
Medicine and Population Health;
School of History, Philosophy, and Digital Humanities;
School of English;
School of Sociological Studies, Politics and International Relations;
Research Partnerships and Innovation.
UEB’s justification for this stressful and destructive course of job losses has shifted from a purely financial framing relating to international student recruitment, to now forefront an ideological position of considering the University’s ‘size and shape’ with no clearly identified targets for savings.
Consistently throughout this dispute, Sheffield UCU has maintained that this level of cuts to the staff budget is both unnecessary and unacceptable, particularly given the financial state of the University based on both publicly available financial data and the financial records we have been privy to in negotiations with management. This university has the historical resources to take a more prudent approach to the drop and volatility in international student numbers, and we simply cannot continue with the ongoing pace of change, with its impact on workload, workplace stress, and morale.
Unfortunately, it seems the Vice-Chancellor and University Executive Board are committed to a programme of short-termist austerity and cuts, with no clear longer term vision.
In May when members stood down our industrial action, we knew that it represented a pause and that we would need to ballot again and be ready for potential action this Autumn.
At that time, the Vice-Chancellor and HR verbally informed the joint trade unions that the list of reviews and restructures planned for the 25/26 academic year would be IT Services, SEAS Language Teachers, and the 5 academic areas currently under review, and the 21 May email from the VC to all staff specifically identified these areas and no others. Today’s announcement contradicts that email, and again reveals the incredibly short term planning of our University leadership.
The addition of these 5 work areas to the targeted VS scheme should be a message to all of us that these cuts are for the sake of cuts, and that no area in the university is safe. There is no level of reviews or job losses that is going to be ‘enough’ unless staff stand together and say no.
We are already balloting for industrial action to fight for the jobs of our colleagues in IT Services, East Asian Studies, the Management School, Civil Engineering, Materials Science and Engineering, Chemistry, and PS colleagues across all Schools. Our fight hasn’t changed today, but our resolve should be hardened by the announcement that Medicine and Population Health; History, Philosophy, and Digital Humanities; English; Sociological Studies, Politics and International Relations; and Research, Partnerships and Innovation are also at risk.
No number of compulsory redundancies are acceptable, and we must resist the constant environment of stress and fear - for ourselves, our colleagues currently at risk, and all of the colleagues who will undoubtedly be at risk in the future unless we do something now.
Vote YES and YES in our IA ballot, and please let us know that you have voted. Our full reasons for balloting and other FAQs can be found at the bottom of this email. Please send in your ballot ASAP. If you need a new ballot paper, you can use this form to request a replacement until Tuesday 23 September 2025 (12 noon).
Come to our next general meeting on 16 September at 1pm to discuss this news, and our ballot.
Vote YES! To Strike Action and YES! to Action Short Of a Strike
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Sheffield UCU Committee is calling on members to vote YES! To Strike Action and YES! to Action Short Of a Strike.
Every member’s support is crucial during the Get The Vote Out campaign for an industrial action ballot! We have compiled some common questions you may hear as you speak to other members about the ballot.
Please have conversations with colleagues and ask them to return their ballots.
Colleagues not in UCU can join us here.
What is the dispute about? How many jobs are at risk?
Since the Vice Chancellor was appointed to the University, we have seen a systemic programme of destabilising change management, with thousands of staff being placed at risk of losing their jobs. For some staff, this stressful experience has happened several times in the last five years. Even for those staff who have not lost their jobs, this campaign has created a demoralising cycle of stress and uncertainty. We need the constant threat to our livelihoods to end, and to have senior leaders who do not see staff as expendable.
In addition to over 1000 staff who have faced disruptive restructures over the 2024/2025 academic year, in May the Vice Chancellor announced the university would be undertaking reviews in 5 academic areas: East Asian Studies, Civil and Structural Engineering, Materials Engineering, Chemistry, and the Management School. This is on top of the university-wide restructuring of professional services staff, the ongoing restructure of IT Services, the upcoming restructure of East Asian Studies language provision, and restructures of Nuclear AMRC and the English Language Teaching Centre which took place at the beginning of the 2024/25 academic year.
Alongside a number of staff that remain in scope for redundancy as a result of the PS staff restructure, the upcoming dispute is about resisting further redundancies and restructuring processes to ensure greater security for all staff. SUCU therefore demands the university:
commit to no compulsory redundancies;
negotiate and agree with UCU on measures to avoid compulsory redundancies;
commit to significantly reducing the planned cuts to staff costs, and to the extent that financial savings are indeed necessary, to shift savings to non-staff budgets;
negotiate and agree with UCU measures to make financial savings without the need to revert to the Management of Change policy/procedure and the issuing of S188 notice of proposed redundancies;
negotiate with UCU over staff workloads and job security, in light of the effects of VSS, Central Vacancy Management, and the ending of fixed-term contracts.
Isn’t there a crisis in Higher Education? Can these problems be solved at Sheffield?
Whilst there is clearly a crisis in the HE sector which requires urgent Government intervention, we don’t believe that the University of Sheffield is in the level of financial difficulty that it is painting itself to be in. The Vice Chancellor and University Executive Board have also failed to take accountability for their own role in the decline in international student numbers.
Using the latest student recruitment data from the Office for Students, our recent article shows that Sheffield had been hit way harder than average in international recruitment.
Further, the branch committee believes that the University has not demonstrated the financial or organisational need for the aggressive and abrupt changes to staffing that have been undertaken and are further proposed. The University’s public accounts demonstrate that it has very little debt, strong reserves, liquidity and an operational surplus, and could afford a more measured approach to its current financial situation.
Weren’t we just out on strike?
Our strike action in Spring was a phenomenal show of strength and we were able to pause all redundancies until the end of the year, ensuring that as many members facing redundancy could be redeployed. However, further cuts have been announced and, as we mentioned at the time, calling off the last dispute was a strategic pause to support those members rather than a full resolution
What type of action will we take?
We are balloting for 2 forms of industrial action, details of which available below:
If we receive a mandate for both forms, we will be able to call both strike action and ASOS, but if we only get a mandate for one (e.g. ASOS), we will only be able to take that form of action.
It’s important to get as clear and strong a mandate as possible to show our strength to management, so we are recommending members to vote YES to both forms on their ballot.
What financial support will be available for striking members?
We are still confirming details over the number of days support available from UCU national, but members should be able to claim from the following 2 sources for lost pay following strike action:
The National Fighting Fund is able to cover £50 per day if you earn over £30,000 and up to £75 per day if you earn under £30,000, from the third day of action. This is expected to be subject to a cap of 8-15 total days claimable. Our Local Industrial Action Solidarity Fund is able to supplement this amount. This support is available to all members of the branch.
General information about claiming from these funds is available below:
Financial Support for Strike Action
How much pay will I lose?
The University normally deducts 1/365th of the annual salary for a full-time employee (pro-rated for part-time arrangements) per day of strike action taken. These deductions are taken pre-tax, so the impact on your take home pay is likely to be less than this. Approximate estimates based on 2022 HE pay spine figures can be found here.
You can attempt to calculate the approximate impact on your take home pay by:
Dividing your gross annual salary by 1/365th to calculate your day rate
Multiply this by the number of days of strike action taken within the payroll period to calculate the gross deduction amount
Subtract this from your gross monthly salary (Gross annual salary divided by 12)
Enter this figure into the Salary Calculator (make sure to enter your tax code, pension contributions, student loan repayments etc to make this as accurate as possible)
This should only be used as a rough estimate, your actual take home pay may differ due to a range of factors.
Does striking actually work?
Withdrawing labour can be one of the most powerful actions that workers in dispute can take. This year, members of Newcastle UCU took 44 days of strike action over the course of 3 months, and achieved an agreement for no compulsory redundancies this year, and that there would be no 'workforce resizing' that was going to threaten 150 jobs next academic year. As a branch, we combine any IA we take with public campaigning and other types of organising to ensure that our action has the most impact.
Crucially though: The longer the picket line the shorter the strike! We need full member participation in our ballot and in any action we take to try to achieve a positive outcome to the dispute.
How can I shape what type of action we take?
The best way to shape the decisions of the branch is to attend general meetings and, especially whilst we are in dispute, the regular extraordinary general meetings that we run as a branch. We are committed to members shaping our strategy through our democratic procedures and general meetings are the best place to do this.
We also run ‘Dispute Committee’ for the duration of disputes. This is a space open to all members of the union to discuss, debate and shape our strategy. If you want to get involved, email us at ucu@sheffield.ac.uk.
Departmental reps will also be engaging with members regularly, so get in touch with them if they haven’t reached out to see if they need any support in organising members within your work area.
Open Letter Regarding the Unite-Veolia Dispute- response from Tom Hunt
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On 21st July 2025, we received the below response from Councillor Tom Hunt (Leader of Sheffield City Council) to the open letter signed by members of Sheffield UCU regarding the Unite-Veolia Dispute (sent 3rd July 2025).
Dear [Sheffield UCU],
It’s good to be in touch. I hope you are well.
Thank you to you and UCU members for contacting me about Veolia and the current industrial action.
Firstly, let me say that the city’s hard working refuse collectors provide an important public service every day for the people of Sheffield. I am extremely grateful for their service.
Secondly, I share your desire to see this dispute resolved as soon as possible. The ongoing dispute is between two unions within Veolia's workforce and not within the Council. But I can assure you that I have been doing as much as I can to find a resolution.
By way of background, it may be helpful to clarify the current situation:
Veolia have a contract to run all household waste and recycling services in Sheffield. Refuse collectors work for Veolia.
Unite are taking industrial action at Veolia because they are seeking official recognition of their union by Veolia.
Veolia have a longstanding recognition agreement with GMB, who represent the majority of the workforce at Veolia. The agreement dates back to 2004.
Veolia’s position is that they are willing to work with both GMB and Unite.
However, as the GMB have the majority membership, the terms of the existing agreement with Veolia require that the GMB must approve this change.
While discussions have taken place between Unite and the GMB, an agreement has not yet been reached.
Unite asked the Central Arbitration Committee (CAC) to review their application for recognition within the Sheffield contract. On the 3rd of April, the CAC as an independent statutory authority, published its decision, rejecting Unite’s application recognising the existing agreement in place between the GMB and Veolia.
As Leader of Sheffield City Council, I have taken an active role to bring all parties together to facilitate negotiations. I continue to encourage all parties to find a negotiated resolution. This has been the Council’s approach throughout the dispute and will continue to be so.
I urge all parties to continue to meet to find a negotiated resolution. We will continue to support the achievement of this outcome and I have stated that I am happy to facilitate further meetings of all the parties.
I hope this helps to outline the Council’s role and position in relation to the dispute.
With best wishes,
Tom