Staff at the Open University are threatening industrial action over “fire and rehire” practices they claim are occurring at their institution.
The provider’s University and College Union (UCU) branch has written to the institution’s vice-chancellor and chair of council to express its “profound sense of shock” that staff members are set to lose their jobs after refusing to sign new employment contracts.
The UCU branch has now said it is considering industrial action, with a spokesperson saying: “The use of fire and rehire calls into question the university leadership’s commitment to its staff and the values of the institution, and is now seeking legal advice and considering potential industrial action.”
The announcement forms part of an ongoing dispute between staff and the university, after the OU put more than 4,000 associate lecturers on casualised terms onto permanent contracts, which saw those staff members receive a pay rise.
But the university claims that this resulted in some staff working excessively long hours of between 45 and 120 hours a week, and it was looking to rebalance this through offering them new contracts with fewer hours.
The union said about 20 lecturers are expected to lose their jobs in the new year after refusing to sign new contracts that would see their pay cut, and that “many” of the 160 staff initially threatened with being fired and rehired confirmed that they had only signed up to reductions in hours and pay “because of that threat”.
However, the university said it “strongly disputes” UCU’s characterisation of events, instead claiming the action was being taken to address unreasonable working hours. A spokesperson added: “We don’t believe it’s good for the OU and crucially we don’t believe it is good for our students.”
They said there was “no place” in education for contracts that permit work “three or four times the standard 37 hours”, which “underlines the need for sensible and constructive change”.
“We remain puzzled about UCU’s stance on this issue given its wider arguments on work-life balance and excessive workloads in the sector, which was a key pillar of UCU’s position in this year's national pay negotiations for the sector,” the spokesperson continued.
Peter Wood, the UCU branch president at the OU, said fire and rehire practices have “no place” in higher education, and the move suggests that “the Open University values neither its staff or students, or cares about its reputation”.
“The university is using fire and rehire to punish staff who are unhappy with their proposals and is trying to bully the process through before changes to the law,” Dr Wood said.
“The plans that the Open University have put in place are unprecedented, unreasonable, unfair, and totally at odds with the institutional values of the university. We urge them to reconsider the current course of action before causing irreparable damage, or face the threat of industrial action.”
