Failing Staff Locally: Falmouth Staff on Strike against Subsidiary Company employment scheme

On Monday 17th October – Wednesday 19th October, senior lecturers and students at Falmouth University took to the picket lines to strike for equal working conditions amongst its staff. In September 2021, management at the university ignored the position of the University and College Union (UCU) and started to employ all its new academic staff through a subsidiary company (Falmouth Staffing Ltd.). The new conditions for staff employed by Falmouth Staffing deny them access to the Teacher’s Pension Scheme, which has a 23.68% employer contribution rate each month, and instead are forced into a FSL pension, where employer contributions start at just 6%.

Striker holding a banner at the entrance of Penryn Campus

The decision to strike came after 90% of the universities UCU members voted in favour of undertaking industrial action in a ballot held this summer after a year long negotiation with management. The Vice Chancellor put out a statement to all students saying, “We were very disappointed that this action has been declared and will have an impact on students while the University is stating its willingness to enter constructive negotiations to resolve this local dispute.”

Despite this, the strike action was greatly supported by the students of the university, with many of them joining their lecturers on the picket lines. Those striking have asked students who want to make a difference to write to the Vice Chancellor about why the issue is important to them and how it impacts their personal education to further persuade management to make a change.

Student supporting their lecturers at the Picket lines

Senior Lecturer and Co-chair of Falmouth UCU branch, Tom Scott said, “We are striking to defend the integrity of the University as an actual University and the rights of the staff that work here. We think that all the staff that work at Falmouth should be properly employed by the University itself and not by a private sub company which has been set up by the University management to evade obligations. This is all about the integrity and reputation of Falmouth, staff won’t want to work here.”

The strikers were also supported by local workers unions. A student and representative for the Bakers union said, “I’m here because I don’t support a two-tier staffing system. Falmouth university has set up a subsidiary company to hire staff which has found a loophole which means that they can get out of the 30-year-old agreement with unions. It means that staff have a lower pension contribution. It means they have less rights. They can’t actually strike today because of it, only students and senior staff can on their behalf.”. A representative for Acorn said, “Acorn is for the most part a community union, obviously Falmouth University is a big part of our local community so it’s important to us that we come and do our bit to support the lecturers.”

Bakers Union Kernow and Acorn join students at the Picket lines

The last time Falmouth University went on strike with the UCU was in 2008 to demand fair pay amongst all its staff. This week, staff are striking because “People that work for Falmouth Staffing can join the union and we can support them in individual cases as case workers, but they can’t vote in any strikes, they can’t take part in any official negotiations, they can’t officially be represented by the union because the union is not recognised and they can’t strike. We found a lot of people didn’t even know they worked for Falmouth Staffing. One employee was told he would face dismissal if he was on strike.”

Poster at the entrance of Penryn Campus

Those picketing also further explained some of the implications that the creation of this subsidiary company has on its employees: “Universities in the UK, post 92 Universities, are signed into something called a national agreement which is an agreement between the Universities, the employer and the union, and that agreement has certain clauses in it that protect the employment rights.”

“There are other impacts as well, for example, continuity of service rights, that’s how you build up the right to, for example, maternity leave and sick leave. These are really serious things and if the university carries on doing this, it’s really badly going to affect it’s whole integrity and it’s representation of the university sector.”

Senior Staff Lecturers at the Picket lines

One lecturer stated, “It’s hypocritical. We have courses on equality and diversity but what’s equal about this?”

When the Anchor approached the Student Union, Falmouth President (Luke Court) and President of Student Experience (Lauren Taylor) commented that they’d “spoken to a number of people at their strike pop-ups last Friday” as well as via email, hearing their thoughts about the recent UCU industrial action: they went on to say that they’re here to here to support students wherever they could. Additionally, both encouraged students to share their thoughts about the strikes, UCU and lectures pay via email (presidents@thesu.org.uk) or Instagram (supresidents).

There were events hosted by the UCU held at various locations throughout Falmouth and Penryn to help the students and local community get more involved with the strike action, this includes an opening talk and picket poster making at the Cornish Bank on Monday morning.

Strikers on the Picket Lines at Penryn Campus

The Falmouth University UCU have asked that all unspent and unpaid wages go to the student hardship fund to support students in need.

You can keep up to date with the lecturers efforts and any future strikes here.