Academics began gearing up for an autumn of joint national industrial action across old and new universities this week as Natfhe conference delegates condemned the current 5 per cent, two-year pay offer as derisory.
Sending a clear signal to employers ahead of final pay talks on June 23, Natfhe resolved to "launch a campaign, including balloting members on joint industrial action with the Association of University Teachers".
Both Sally Hunt, AUT general secretary, and her deputy, Malcolm Keight, told Natfhe delegates that they would unite in opposition to this year's pay offer to avoid last year's damaging divisions over tactics.
The motion from Natfhe's higher education committee said the current pay offer "does nothing at all to address the huge pay gap identified over many years, and will not meet projected inflation."
National pay negotiator John Wilkinson, of Coventry University, said the offer might even represent a pay cut in light of current inflation projections .
"We made a modest claim (for 11 per cent in one year)," he said. "But the employers have thrown down the gauntlet for a fight. Perhaps they were expecting a different outcome for the debate yesterday (which agreed to recommend merger with the AUT).
"The unions will stand together, and a strong, successful pay campaign would be just what we need to start the life of the new union."
Mr Keight said employers had been "disingenuous" about how much money will come to the sector through top-up fees next year.
The conference carried a motion condemning employers' "bad faith" in implementing last year's pay modernisation Framework Agreement, which put all staff from professors to porters on a single new pay spine. The motion, from the East Midlands branch, said that there were "gross disparities in the pace and nature of implementation at local level".