Post-92 contract ‘at risk’ in wave of university cost-cutting

Lecturers at modern universities in the UK fear a “chipping away” of their working conditions in the current round of cost-cutting and redundancies, which could precipitate a “massive change” in what it means to be an academic.

Several institutions have been accused of devising plans that would breach national agreements including the “post-92 national contract” that outlines various rights lecturers, senior lecturers and principal lecturers should enjoy while working at the former polytechnics, and the 2004 national framework that introduced a uniform pay structure across the sector.

Post-92 universities have argued the agreements have become outdated and put them out of step with practices at other institutions. 

But University and College Union (UCU) branches have begun organising to defend the frameworks, which they say prevent a “race to the bottom” in staff terms and conditions.

“We can’t allow it to be eroded, chipped away at, until you are in a situation where working conditions at every post-92 are considerably worse than they were before,” said Mark Abel, chair of the University of Brighton UCU branch, one of the institutions where changes have been proposed.

At Brighton – as at Sheffield Hallam University – grade nine principal lecturer posts have been heavily impacted in a wave of redundancies and both institutions have sought to create new roles at grade six of the national pay spine, a grade rarely used by post-92s but utilised by older universities.

Ben Abell, the branch secretary at Sheffield Hallam UCU, said this breached the 2004 framework and the branch was concerned the new roles would be “poorly paid with overwhelming teaching loads, leaving little opportunity to develop careers with research work”. The university said it was not replacing its principal lecturers with the new role, which was a “new entry-level position for those looking to begin their academic career, and similar roles are used successfully in other universities”.

Many of these posts will be teaching-focused and Brighton is seeking to remove the 18-hour weekly cap on student contact hours – arguing that a more flexible approach is needed which would allow for more intensive teaching periods throughout the year – and introduce a system whereby staff have to bid for time to do research.

Brighton’s Dr Abel said the risk was that only some academics would remain in the traditional lecturer role, with time to develop their knowledge of a subject, revise curricula and produce teaching materials, while newer staff may find themselves reliant on others to dictate what they teach.  

“People not doing research is just the starting point here,” he said. “It could slip into people not doing any sort of scholarship at all. That is a massive change in what we understand university education to be about.”

Dr Abel said he felt universities were “testing the water to see what they can get away with” and warned other measures such as a 550-hour annual cap on teaching hours – generally considered to be “sacrosanct” – could come under threat next.

Gregor Gall, a visiting professor in industrial relations at the University of Leeds, said it was clear that the current financial pressures were going to result in more academics spending more time teaching and less on research, with older universities – such as the University of Kent – also affected.

He said this would “rob younger and early-career academics of opportunities for personal enhancement” such as increased job satisfaction and opportunities for promotion.

Moves to prioritise teaching over research were also unlikely to solve universities’ financial struggles, said Professor Gall, as all were chasing after a limited pot of students.

tom.williams@timeshighereducation.com