Produced by Queen’s UCU Issue No 11 October 2006
A Rose by Any Other Name ¼ We have decided to call ourselves Queen’s UCU rather than our first idea of QUB UCU. However, when the initials are expanded to words we will not use Queen’s University and College Union because of the ambiguity in how it can be scanned. Instead we will refer to ourselves as the University and College Union at Queen’s.
Dates of Meetings The time and place of UCU meetings in the coming academic year are on our local website quis.qub.ac.uk/ucu Most of the dates will also be on our local wall planner, but the printing was delayed until recently. It will be distributed soon.
Make Your Priorities Known The new union will be a success only if it fulfils the wishes of the great bulk of its members. Unfortunately most members are passive and do not attend General Meetings or feed into the other democratic structures. If there is any local issue that you want addressed, feel free to bend the ear of any local Officer. (Contact details are on the wall planner.) At national level Sally Hunt, Joint General Secretary, has asked you to indicate your priorities through a questionnaire on www.ucu.org.uk/index.cfm?articleid=1812 You will need your membership number in order to participate; if you have forgotten it, just phone Queen’s UCU office, extension 3090 (mornings only).
Funding and Assessing Research After 2008 UCU is holding a conference on this on 12 October at UCU’s Britannia Street Conference Centre, London WC1. This public policy conference is open to members and other professionals involved in HE research and features expert speakers from across the field. The conference will analyse the context for the Government’s proposed changes, hear about international comparisons and experiences, discuss the implications of metrics for UK HE and consider approaches to research assessment and funding. It will also launch the findings of UCU’s own survey of academics and researchers. For further information go to https//asp.artegis.com using login ‘UCURES06’ and password ‘Funding’. If you are keen to go, Queen’s UCU will pay the conference fee and reasonable travel expenses for up to two members. Contact Julian Warner (ext 3343).
Panel Members — Statute XVI Heads of School will have received an obscure circular about this which they may have passed on to some of their staff. For those who do not have QUB Statutes engraved upon their hearts, Statute XVI deals with employment matters, and what is being sought is a list of members of staff willing to sit on panels hearing serious discipline cases or grievance cases or the associated appeals. The Academic Council office would select from the list a member of academic or research staff to be a member of a three person panel to hear a case involving a member of academic or research staff. (There is a parallel set up for academic related staff.)
Belfast AUT was heavily involved in negotiations on the regulations governing discipline and grievance and knows what is intended. Obviously someone hearing such cases needs to have experience of the realities of employment in Queen’s. However, contrary to what some Heads of School believe, this does not restrict the list to Heads of School, Professors, Readers and Senior Lecturers. Any member of academic and research staff, including Teaching Fellows, who is willing to carry out these duties should contact Ms T Smyth, Level 6, Admin Building by 20 October. We want a list that reflects the whole diversity of the group and is not predominately made up of those whose most recent work experience is in academic management. We would particularly encourage female or ethnic minority members to apply.
Visas for the Republic of Ireland Until recently non-EC citizens needed to go through a lengthy and expensive process of obtaining a single entry visa whenever they wanted to cross the border. (Some of you may be wondering “Why bother as there are no visible border controls.” However these emerge if you have a dark skin.) This has seriously hampered cross-border academic activities for non-EC citizens. After a lengthy campaign by QUB, initiated by Belfast AUT, arrangements have now been made for such people to be able to obtain a multi-entry RoI visa valid for the length of their UK visa.
Employers’ Liability for Employees’ Harassment A House of Lords judgment has confirmed that the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 applies to harassment of all types and protects employees while they are at work as elsewhere. Where one employee, in the scope of his or her employment, harasses another employee or anyone else the employer will be vicariously liable for that harassment if a sufficiently clear link between work and the harassment can be established. This means that Heads of School and other managers must take any complaint of harassment, bullying or mistreatment made by an employee or student extremely seriously, and not try to brush it aside as many would like to do.
Importantly, under the Act it is not necessary for the victim of the harassment to prove that they have suffered an injury (whether physical or mental). Harassment is not specifically defined by the Act and may cover many types of situation in which an employee is caused alarm, anxiety or distress. Thus damages may be claimed in cases of bullying in which there is no apparent element of religious, race or sex discrimination. Moreover, the time limit for claims under the Act is six years. This compares favourably with the three month time limit for discrimination cases taken to a Tribunal. For more information see www.workplacelaw.net
The Thomas Devlin Fund You will recall that this young man was tragically killed on the street in an apparent random knife attack just over a year ago. You may not know that he was the son of Penny Holloway who for many years ran the AUT at UU and was also a National President. The Fund (which is a registered charity) has been set up in his memory and the trustees want the Fund to have a positive effect, through providing support in the form of bursaries or grants for young people involved in the creative arts and music. They are holding a fund raising dinner on 20 October. You can get further information on the fund and the dinner on www.thomasdevlin.com
Access to E-Mails We have hear of management in one unit demanding the password to members’ personal e-mail file “so that we can deal with business in your absence.” Such requests should be stoutly resisted since it would enable management to read personal communications whenever they wished. The answer is to set up an common e-mail address for just business matters.
Age Discrimination In the FE sector UCU has reached an agreement with the employers on guidance for age equality in employment. In the university sector the employers are generally making the narrowest possible interpretation of the legislation, although Liverpool John Moores has been forced to offer the same redundancy terms to those over 60 as to other staff. QUB too has done little; the retirement date for academic and related staff remains the 30 September following their 65th birthday. They can request employment beyond that date, but there is very little detail as to how that request will be considered, and UCU is pressing for a clearer procedure. But the legislation has implications in other areas. There are doubts about the validity of setting minimum periods between one promotion and another and also about the forced gaps between the award of one contribution point and another. We will be examining all aspects of QUB regulations in the light of the new legislation.
Paul Hudson