OPEN UNIVERSITY BRANCH OF THE
UNIVERSITY AND COLLEGE UNION
MINUTES OF THE ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING HELD ON
23rd November 2010
Venue: Berrill Lecture Theatre, Walton Hall
Webcast: http://stadium.open.ac.uk/stadia/preview.php?whichevent=1586&s=1
Present: Roger Walters (Branch President), Lesley Kane (Hon. Secretary), David Knowles (Hon. Treasurer) and members on the attendance list.
In attendance: Deb Shann (Branch Administrator) & Lydia Richards (UCU Regional Official)
Minutes of the last AGM (23rd November 2009), the General meeting on 28th September 2010 and the emergency General meeting on 9th November 2010 were all approved as true records.
Matters arising: Arising from the 2009 AGM, a member asked for an update on salary sacrifice.
The President responded that the branch had tried to re-open negotiations with the OU but there remained a complete impasse. Members should therefore continue to boycott the scheme.
Alan Carr reported that there would be another opportunity to re-open the campaign and negotiations following the USS Board meeting in January 2011.
President’s Report
The President has been in regular communication with all UCU members via email updates after each Exec meeting as well as the Spark newsletter so would only provide a very brief summary of the last year but would take questions on any appropriate issue. The highlight of the last 12 months for him had been attending the Fund our future demonstration on 10th November 2010 with the brand new OU UCU banner. He was pleased that so many OU branch members took part in the demonstration.
He had has been in email communication with the Vice Chancellor about the Browne Report and there was a clear difference of opinion, as the Vice Chancellor was far more positive because of the partial leveling of the playing field between full time and part time education. He felt that the Browne report had to be considered together with the Comprehensive Spending Review which together represented a massive attack on the Higher Education sector, although we do not yet know the full impact.
Roger encouraged all members to vote in the UCU referendum on the USS proposals – any USS member can vote as well as anyone eligible to join the USS which meant all OU staff could vote. The UCU referendum web address is: http://www.ucu.org.uk/ussreferendum.
There is a UCU Special HE Sector conference on 25th November and the branch would be sending a full delegation. The conference would consider a proposal from the Higher Education committee for two simultaneous ballots on industrial action after 20th January 2011, the date of the meeting of the USS Board, one on the attack on USS and one on the national dispute.
The branch was monitoring the external advertising ban as sometimes UCU was not being consulted, or not being consulted meaningfully. There are workload issues for staff where members of staff are not replaced. It was probable that the Council had this morning declared a potential redundancy situation in three areas of the University:
· CHERI which was based in London and was to be closed;
· FELS because of funding cuts by the Training and Development Agency which affected those staff in English regions who supported the PGCE;
· Student Services in the light of the decision to dispense with the position of Regional Directors in the English regions.
There were a number of other recent and current organizational reviews including in the Science Faculty.
Roger reported that we needed a stronger branch and we needed members to get involved. He adapted the famous Kennedy expression, and urged members to “think not what the union can do for you, but what you can do for the union.” We especially need more Academic staff members to become active.
Roger invited the meeting to ask questions or make comments.
A member asked about the Enhanced early retirement scheme, and expressed concern that some people who wanted to take advantage of the scheme were not being allowed to go forward by their Head of Unit. It would be useful to know how widespread this was.
Roger answered that units could only put people forward if they could meet the cost of so doing, which usually meant not replacing them, and only about 20 cases had so far been submitted by units to the panel, and most had been accepted. But it was understood that others were in the pipeline. Roger would try to find out how many cases were blocked but if members are aware of problems, they should email the branch mailbox at .
Another member asked about the number of potential redundancies in the 3 areas being reviewed.
Roger answered that in CHERI 8 members of staff were affected; the PGCE cuts affected 5 people, most of them who undertook a mix of PGCE and other work and the total saving sought was 1.9 full time equivalents. Posts were affected and in Student Services there would be a net loss of 8 grade 10 posts but only 5 people were affected, as some of the posts were already vacant. Roger agreed that re-deployment should be the first option for these people if they so wished but there was a location problem for CHERI staff as their office is in London and some of them would not wish to move or travel to Milton Keynes, and the position for the affected FELS staff was complicated because they undertook a mix of PGCE and other duties.
Hon. Secretary’s Report
Lesley reported that she dealt with organizational issues such as the branch office, website and Exec sub-groups – these were all now up and running, and functioning better than they had in the past. Lesley reported that the AL negotiations had been protracted but it was hoped to report progress fairly soon.
Lesley was concerned that the OU would become a be a very different institution in the future in the light of the Browne report and the Comprehensive Spending Review and that its original mission would be endangered.
Hon. Treasurer’s Report
The Treasurer circulated a copy of the branch accounts for the financial year 1st Sept 2009 - 31st August 2010. He talked about the local subs which were increased by 25% last year and this increase came into effect on the 1st September 2010. He was not proposing an increase for the next year. There had been an increase in subscription income due to the local subs increase and the union had introduced a new subscription band so that there were now 6 bands. All full time members in HE were now charged at the top band as a default option, unless they indicated otherwise. Members should be aware that they could now edit their personal information on the UCU eServices website: https://members.ucu.org.uk and for those earning under £40,000 this would mean a lower subscription rate.
David reported on bank interest. The 2009 AGM asked the branch to re-organise its finances and there were now have 5 new accounts with Scottish Widows, Harpenden Building Society, Bath Building Society, Hanley Economic Building Society and Vernon Building Society. The full year’s bank interest that the branch will receive on these investments is £5358.
David mentioned the £22,000 loss that the branch made in the last financial year. This was partly due to having 2 away days in 1 year, the branch administrator cost and the cost of the paper issue of the Spark newsletter. We planned to continue normally sending the Spark only on email but with 1 paper copy per year. We need to review expenditure but increased expenditure was mainly a reflection of increased activity in part due to having an an administrator to undertake that activity. £40,000 was spent on meetings and travel expenses. The Treasurer did not want the branch to eat into its reserves too much.
A member welcomed the fact that the branch has re-organised its finances but proposed that the branch considers video conferencing to save money on travel expenses. She also asked about £4000 spent on services by Popularis for elections and ballots – how did this compare with what other branches spend?
David answered that he would not want the branch to return to counting its own votes in a ballot or election and Popularis is considerably cheaper than the Electoral Reform Service that the branch used to use. Unfortunately the electronic election is no cheaper than a paper one, but David feels that it is the way forward. David agreed that we need to look at using video conferencing for our meetings. Roger commented that our elections must be conducted by a third party and we are very different from all other branches who do not have a dispersed membership, so this expenditure was unavoidable.
Report by the returning officer, Lydia Richards, on the elections to the branch executive committee and for AL regional representatives for the 2010/2011 year.
The Returning officer reported on these elections as in Appendix 1. She explained that the spoilt ballot papers were in most cases where members had chosen not to vote in that particular elections completed the election website correctly. There were some issues over the web-based election this year but she reported that the process was fair and only very few people had problems. She would prepare a report for the Exec meeting on the electronic election and the full results of the Election would shortly be circulated to all members.
A member asked about the election statements as she wanted to read them all before voting and the website did not allow you to do this. She would also like to have read the election statements from the unopposed Officers. She expressed concern at the very low turnout.
Lydia replied that it was possible to read each election statement without voting, but it was not easy and she agreed that it would be a good idea to have them all listed in a separate area of the election website. Lydia reported that the statements of unopposed Officers were not normally included but she would log this point.
David commented that he felt that the lower turnout was due to the web method being used and there should have been more reminders. Roger commented that there were reminders to people who had not voted and it was our first attempt at an electronic election and so there were bound to be some issues. Members were encouraged to send any comments on the elections to the branch mailbox: . Roger is most concerned by the low turnout as it was approximately 200 votes less than took part 2 years ago. The Exec needed to look at ways to increase turnout in good time for the 2011 elections.
AL Regional Reps committee there were no contested elections and the list of those elected unopposed was included in Appendix 1.
Emergency motion
Roger asked if the AGM was happy to accept an emergency motion on the grounds that it could not have been submitted in time because the proposers were not then aware that this was a widespread problem and the meeting agreed.
Lesley Kane proposed the motion and detailed the problem where members of staff on fixed term contracts were expected to re-pay the difference between statutory maternity pay and OU maternity pay if they did not return to work after their maternity leave, when they were able and willing to do so but prevented from doing so by the OU because their contract had expired meantime.
One of the members directly affected by this spoke to the AGM and asked for clarity in communications from HR.
Lydia commented that in 18 years as a regional Union official she has never seen anything like this and she happy to offer the UCU Regional office’s support on the issue.
The motion was put to a vote and the AGM agreed to it unanimously.
“This AGM asks the branch committee to:-
· Seek legal advice on the situation;
· Seek a renegotiation of the policy on maternity pay so that women who can't return to work as a result of a decision taken by the university (e.g. to make them redundant) do not have to repay part of their maternity pay;
· Ask national UCU to find out if a similar policy is being pursued in other colleges and universities, and if so to initiate a campaign to change these policies.
· If necessary to campaign within the OU community, and also seek support elsewhere including from funding organisations to bring an end to policies, both in the OU and in any other institutions, that penalise vulnerably employed pregnant staff by requiring them to pay back part of their maternity pay if they are made redundant.”
Date of next Branch meeting:
Wednesday 9th March 2011 at 12.30 in Library Seminar Room, Library, Walton Hall – but there may be an emergency branch meeting called earlier than this date, in view of industrial action.
Appendix 1
BRANCH ELECTIONS 2010 (Executive Committee)
Result of ballot of all elections
PRESIDENT
ALAN CARR / 169ROGER WALTERS / 208 / ELECTED
Spoilt (no votes submitted) / 11
Total ballot papers received / 388 / 19%
Total ballot papers dispatched / 2059
VICE PRESIDENT (TWO to be elected)
PAULINE COLLINS / 131 / ELECTEDMICHAEL McNULTY / 112
BETHAN NORFOR / 123 / ELECTED
Spoilt ballot papers / 22
Total ballot papers received / 388 / 19%
Total ballot papers dispatched / 2059
HON. SECRETARY Lesley Kane elected unopposed
HON. TREASURER David Knowles elected unopposed
EQUALITY OFFICER No candidates
CENTRAL ACADEMIC STAFF OFFICER
AXEL HAGERMANN / 111SHEILA TYLER / 215 / ELECTED
Spoilt ballot papers / 62
Total ballot papers received / 388 / 19%
Total ballot papers dispatched / 2059
CENTRAL ACADEMIC-RELATED STAFF OFFICER No candidates