News

This message is to bring you up to date with some of the issues that the OU UCU branch is currently dealing with. We will be contacting you again, probably in a week or so, with an update on the Curriculum Review and its implications for staff who are affected.
 

We were pleased to be able to have a joint Unions stand at the OU's Charter day on 8th May - we shared the stand with the Open University branch of UNISON and the Open University Chapel of the National Union of Journalists.

There are photos on our Facebook page at this address: www.facebook.com/oubucu.

Trade Unions have been part of the OU Community since the beginning in 1969, the OU will be celebrating its 50th birthday in 2019.

Our UCU Regional Official, Lydia Richards, was interviewed on the Today Programme, BBC Radio 4 on 23rd March 2018.

The audio is on https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09vyw3z

Today Programme 23/03/2018 8.46am

We promised summary notes from our national UCU meetings on 14 March. This was meant as a report on  the major events of the early week around USS so that we could answer questions. But we know many people are not using OU email during the strike, so this is not the end of the conversation! Here's an update and we intend to have our next all members' meeting on 26th March.

UCU members will have have received an email tonight (12th March) from Sally Hunt regarding the ACAS talks. The negotiators have come back with a proposal that we assume they wish to put to members.
https://www.ucu.org.uk/media/9300/Agreement-reached-between-UCU-and-UUK-under-the-auspices-of-ACAS/pdf/UCU_UUK_agreement_at_ACAS_12_March_Final.pdf
 

Thanks to concerted pressure from both the UCU branch executive and individual members the VC has agreed to a meeting with the Branch president Lesley Kane and Vice President Caitlin Adams on Monday (12th) next week. This is a step forward and provides an opportunity for the VC to listen and reconsider the approach taken by the University over the dispute.

Congress is the supreme policy making body of the union.

If any branch member wants to suggest a motion for the OU UCU branch to put forward to Congress or to HE Conference, please send it to [email protected] by close of business on Friday 9th March, or email [email protected] if you have an idea for a motion and want help in drafting it. 

Motions that are specific to Higher Education are usually considered appropriate for HE Conference.

Dear Mr Horrocks,
 
Thank you for your recent comments on OU news regarding the ongoing USS pensions dispute, and the industrial action that UCU are taking in response to the proposed changes.
 
However, we are profoundly concerned and disappointed with some quite serious inaccuracies in your public position, which puts you at odds with both UCU’s financial assessments of USS, and increasing numbers of sector VC’s who have accepted the current USS valuation is, at best, deeply flawed.
 

21st February 2018
 
As we sit on the brink of an industrial action that nobody wants, it is not too late for the Open University to take a leadership position in averting these strikes. We urge you to consider the recent comments of Anthony Forster, the Vice Chancellor of Essex University (see http://blogs.essex.ac.uk/vc/)

We are asking members to email the VC to protest about the refusal to re-schedule the Senate workshop on 22nd February for a non-strike day. Please feel free to copy in the university secretary Keith Zimmerman. 

There is suggested text below explaining the reasons for this, and please feel free to add to it or modify it.