News

Excessive workload in parts of the university is often flagged up to us by our reps and caseworkers.

UCU has developed a workload survey which we are inviting all members to fill in at this address: https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/8PBG6GR, to find out how widespread this is, and to find out how many of you are feeling under pressure.

At the Branch meeting on 17th September our guest speaker Carlo Morelli from the UCU and University of Dundee gave an overview of the Pay and Equality ballot and also answered questions about the pension scheme (USS).

The branch executive therefore thought this was a good time to send an update on the pensions dispute. We are also planning to hold a branch meeting in October in order to consider the branch’s position on USS once further information is available.

We have sent the calling notice to all OU UCU members for the annual election of our Executive Committee.

It is the time of year once again to start the process of electing our UCU branch officers and committee members. The deadline for nominations is 4pm on Friday 5th October 2018, and the election results will be announced at our Annual General Meeting on 15th November 2018.

One of our AL reps, Kevin McNerney, did a talk in our Adobe Connect room on 28th August at 6.30pm.

The talk was called OU Employment Contracts: enigmas wrapped up in mysteries and there is a recording of it at this address: https://learn3.open.ac.uk/mod/connecthosted/view.php?id=135696.

The link is for OU staff only, click the "view previous recordings" option in the top right hand corner of the page.

The rules on pay in lieu of notice (PILON) changed in April 2018 and now all payments in lieu of notice will be taxable, whether contractual or non-contractual.

So if someone works their notice, they will obviously be paid and taxed on their salary in the normal way up until the date of termination. Any compensation payment they are then given is tax free up to £30,000.

Our Equality Officer, Denzil DeSouza, has recently resigned his position on the Executive Committee as he is leaving the Open University at the end of 2018. Denzil has been on the Executive Committee for 3 years and has played an active part in helping with technology at branch meetings and pursuing equality issues with the university. Denzil was on the interview panel when our Branch Administrator, Deb Shann, first got a job with the Open University back in 2007, Deb and the branch will all miss Denzil!

Pay deductions, OU UCU's hardship fund, and local subscriptions
We expect that by now most deductions from pay for strike action over the pensions dispute will have been made, so the local hardship fund process has now closed. We are not closing the hardship bank account entirely because there is the possibility that further industrial action may be necessary: the pensions disagreement has not yet been resolved, and there is still much uncertainty about job losses and potential involuntary redundancies at the OU.

Members will have received an email recently from Sally Hunt, the UCU General Secretary, indicating that at the recent Congress there were walk-outs by staff of the union. The staff objected to two motions that were to be debated. One was to censure the General Secretary and one was to call for the resignation of the General Secretary. The General Secretary is a Unite member and Unite were of the view that Congress could not debate these motions.

A member consultation on the final offer has opened on 6th June 2018 and it will close on 27th June.

Please make sure you use your vote and we are holding an all members meeting on 12th June at 1pm.  The meeting will be in Seminar Room 6, 2nd floor, at the back of the OU Library, Walton Hall or you can take part by Skype. Please email ucu@open.ac.uk for the Skype meeting link.

There is further information on the UCU website or here are the pay rises HE staff have received in previous years.

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.