The Vice-Chancellor has invoked the University’s Supplementary Study Regulations for Taught Programmes, and guidance and supporting resources have been developed to assist Schools with managing the impact on assessment processes and the implementation of the Supplementary Study Regulations.

Key areas covered by the guidance include:

• General Considerations for Impact of Industrial Action on Assessment
• Marking and Moderation
• Supplementary Study Regulations
• Boards of Examiners
• Prioritisation of Cohorts
• Postgraduate Research Students

Training on the Supplementary Study Regulations will be provided by the Quality Assurance and Regulations Team who will be in touch to confirm details in due course. In the meantime, please contact qar@qub.ac.uk if you have any queries.

Students should continue to prepare for and submit any form of assessment scheduled during industrial action as normal.

We have published guidance for UG, PGT and PGR students on the My Queen’s website, setting out how we will work to ensure that their education and learning outcomes are not disadvantaged as a result of the marking and assessment boycott – while respecting our colleagues’ right to take lawful action. Staff are asked to please read and continue to review this guidance for updates.

UCU have voted to take industrial action in relation to changes to the Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS), a national pension scheme, and also in relation to pay and working conditions. Unite the Union is also taking industrial action in relation to pay.

This is primarily a national dispute that the University cannot resolve unilaterally. However, we will continue to use our influence to shape and inform the national debate.

Responsibility for resolving the pensions dispute lies with members of the Joint Negotiating Committee (UUK, who represent the sector employers, and the UCU who represent employees). The Universities and Colleges Employers Association (UCEA) are responsible for resolving the dispute relating to pay and conditions with UCU.

• Read UCEA's response to UCU's IA update
• Read more on UCEA's latest pay offer - 26 January 2023

This is primarily a national dispute that the University cannot resolve unilaterally. However, we, as employers, remain fully committed to continuing to use our influence to shape and inform the national debate.

We remain committed to working in partnership with all trade unions to deal with local issues.

Recently, we have worked closely with our local UCU colleagues and made significant progress in areas such as the gender pay gap.

In October 2022, the Vice-Chancellor announced a multi-million support package of £7.69 million for students and staff facing the current cost of living crisis. In the context of cost of living pressures, we are committed to supporting our people during this challenging time.

In addition to support being offered by government and public services, we want to play our role. In October 2022, we announced a cost of living payment of £750/£500 to be paid to staff in January 2023. This assistance with the cost of living crisis comes on top of the national pay award in August and also follows the £1,000 COVID-19 recognition payments we made to staff in June of this year to thank you for your work and commitment to the University as we navigated the pandemic.

Together with the 3% nationally agreed pay award, these payments equate to an increase of between 5.22% and 16.69% for staff with respect to the August 2021 salary.

You can view the actual percentage increase by spine point here.

It has been our priority to develop a series of measures to support the Queen’s community during the escalating crisis. To this end, we have launched a dedicated website to provide a suite of information for our University community on support and interventions in place to assist staff and students during the cost of living crisis.

This cost of living hub sets out information and resources for staff and students, including how to access help and advice.

In October 2022, the Vice-Chancellor announced a multi-million support package of £7.69 million for students and staff facing the current cost of living crisis. In the context of cost of living pressures, we are committed to supporting our people during this challenging time.

The package of support announced by the Vice-Chancellor includes:

• The Department for the Economy have increased their allocation to £2.7 million to support students for this academic year. In addition, Queen’s will allocate a new funding package of just under £5.7 million.
• We will increase the value of the institutional bursary. This will take the form of a one-off cost of living payment of £400. 3,600 students at Queen's who come from families with an income of under approximately £25,000 per annum will benefit from this intervention.
• We will also give all other students – both undergraduate and postgraduate – a one-off payment of £150.
• £600,000 will be allocated to focus on supporting our international students, who are not eligible for an award from the Department for the Economy funds.
• After listening to students about accessing the schemes, we’ve streamlined the application process for our student support funds to ensure that students get access to funding quicker.
• These payments will be made in January 2023.
• Additionally, we will waive all Graduation fees for December 2022 and Summer 2023 – currently at £47 – for this academic year only. This new intervention will cost the University £250,000. However, students will still have the option to attend a graduation garden party at a cost of £10 per person, if they so choose.
• We will also waive all student library fines for this academic year and reduce the cost of Off Campus Discipline fines by 50%.

Cost of living website

It has been our priority to develop a series of measures to support the Queen’s community during the escalating crisis. To this end, we have launched a dedicated website to provide a suite of information for our students and staff on support and interventions in place to assist you during the cost of living crisis.

This cost of living website sets out information and resources for staff and students, including how to access help and advice.

For more information, please visit our cost of living website.

This is primarily a national dispute that the University cannot resolve unilaterally. However, other matters such as casualisation, workload and equality are of equal importance to staff and have emerged as prominent topics in the debate at both a local and national level.

These are issues that the University does have greater influence over and a range of interventions that have already been underway to improve working conditions for our staff, with more changes planned. These include:

• While, since 2017, we have narrowed the institutional equal pay gap from 20.4% to 18.1% (2020), we recognise there is more to be done. We are committed to building on this work with the publication of a new Equal Pay Audit later this year.
• We have worked closely with local UCU representatives in recent years on the Extended Workforce Project to undertake a fundamental review of all atypical contracts ensuring that contracts and pay rates are appropriate for the type of work. We have embedded the QWork operating model to engage casual workers. The Extended Workforce Project has also initiated work to pilot a review of the employment status of teaching assistants in AHSS, following which the review will be extended to all teaching assistants.
• A tranche of colleagues employed on fixed-term contracts as part of the response to the COVID-19 pandemic have already been made permanent. A working group which includes trade union representatives is in place to oversee the wider transitioning of staff on fixed-term contracts to permanent positions, where appropriate; and to clarify acceptable objective justifications for the continuing use of fixed-term contracts, particularly in relation to research contracts.
• A working group, led by Interim Provost and Deputy Vice-Chancellor Stuart Elborn, established to review our approach to workload allocation is progressing. An academic work planning system, Simitive, has now been procured. This will deliver a platform that will enable the allocation of work in a transparent and fair way, providing schools and Faculties with information for future workforce planning. It is expected that Simitive will be available in Semester 1 2023-24.
• Strategic investment was made in 100 additional academic and 50 professional services staff. Significant progress has been made to fill these posts, which will positively impact workload issues.
• Several of the ongoing digital projects will also have a positive impact on academic workload, as well as the Ways of Working review which aims to reduce administrative workload by re-designing processes, stream-lining decision-making, and adopting digital technologies to create more time to invest effort in our core activities of teaching, research, and our staff and student experience.
• A new Staff Health and Wellbeing team has been appointed to development a new Staff Health and Wellbeing Plan for the University.
• As a University, we have a very strong reputation, both locally and nationally, for our commitment to equality, diversity and inclusion in the workplace and on campus generally. Both our People and Culture Plan and a new institutional Equality Scheme Action Plan shall set out our commitment to engage with, and listen to our staff, on important issues such as these. We are recognised among the top UK universities for gender equality practices by the flagship accreditation scheme, Athena SWAN Charter, and we are committed to progressing other work in respect of racial, LGBTQ+ and disability equality.
• Following the review of the pilot year, we have developed new guidance in support of agile working which was launched in March 2023. This includes new Hybrid Working Guidance, which sets out three staff categories, with suggested proportions of time working on campus. We have also developed new Communication and Accessibility Guidance to ensure that we all embrace digital working, and embed good practices in our day-to-day work, wherever we may be based.
• A one-off exceptional payment of £1,000 was made to staff in the July 2022 payroll in recognition of their dedication during the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic, with our more regular casual workers receiving a recognition payment of £150.
• A cost-of-living payment was made to all staff (except senior management) and students totalling £7.69 million in January 2023. A new financial assistance scheme was developed allowing staff to secure an interest free loan.
• The University has paid the Real Living Wage since August 2022 and plans to become accredited by January 2024.

The nature of Industrial Action means that the University will not know in advance how many colleagues decide to participate. From past experience, it is reasonable to assume that some Schools/Directorates will be affected more than others.

UCU ballot: This was undertaken on an aggregated basis in Northern Ireland. In relation to pay and conditions, 775 members of UCU voted, with 609 voting for strike action and 694 voting for action short of strike. In relation to pensions, 729 members of UCU voted, with 585 voting for strike action and 658 voting for action short of strike.

Unite the Union ballot: 129 members were eligible to vote and 94 voted. The results in relation to strike action were 81 voting for and 13 against. In relation to Action Short of Strike, the results were 88 for and 6 against.

If you are not taking part in the action, you will only be affected by potentially being asked to help the University to mitigate the impact on students for example by helping to rearrange assessments required for professional accreditation purposes or to make a note of those classes that have been cancelled in order to understand the impact on students.

Your line manager will advise of these details as necessary.

The University recognises and appreciates that many staff will not take strike action; staff who do participate in the strike action will be required to notify the University by completing an online form.

When staff who participated are required to complete this form, an email will be issued to all staff, asking them to do so.

We are making every effort to ensure that students are not adversely affected more than is unavoidable and are closely monitoring the impact of the industrial action. We expect the impact of the action to vary across the University and to be very limited in some areas. Many students will not be affected at all.

Unless advised otherwise, students should attend lectures and tutorials as normal.

If activities are, or have been, cancelled, the University will make every reasonable effort to mitigate the impact. While it is unlikely that it will be possible to ‘replace’ the teaching that has been missed, our priority for all students will be the delivery of required learning outcomes of the programme.

Schools will be in direct contact with affected students when the full impact of the industrial action is known.

Further details are available in the FAQs for students.

Students will receive email updates to their University email account and are being signposted to a student-facing webpage with FAQs.

In relation to any impact on assessment, students have been advised that as far as possible, in assessments students will not be expected to demonstrate learning against material that has not been delivered as a result of industrial action. Where necessary, adjustments to assessments will be made to facilitate this, which may include:

1. Changes to the assessment itself to align with the minimum engagement opportunities that the cohort will have with the material.
2. Reviewing the choice of questions within the assessment so that students can self-select topics with which they were able to fully engage.
3. Making markers and moderators aware of any variations in available engagement opportunities across the cohort and the anticipated impact that would have on student ability to fully complete the assessment, so that the marking scheme can be adjusted accordingly.
   

There may be some exceptions to this, for example, if assessment is required for professional accreditation purposes. In these circumstances alternative arrangements will be made and students will be contacted by their School. 

Unless informed otherwise, students should prepare for any form of assessment, including submissions deadlines, scheduled during strike action as normal. If it is not possible for scheduled assessments to go ahead, Schools will inform students of any alternative arrangements.

Schools will be providing students with as much information as possible at a local level about the impact of strike action and any steps being taken to mitigate this impact.

Students will receive email updates to their University email account and are being signposted to a student-facing webpage with FAQs.

For questions relating specifically to their course, assessment, cancelled classes etc., students are being directed to contact their School Office.

Staff in Grade 6 and above

For those staff in Grade 6 and above who do take strike action, one day’s pay will be withheld, for each day of strike action, on the basis of 1/365th of an employee’s salary. This will be calculated on a pro-rata basis for part-time staff.

Grades 6 above: working the hours required to do the job. In light of the Supreme Court ruling in Hartley versus King Edward VI College in 2017, pay for staff with this type of contract has to be apportioned over the entire year, i.e. 365 days.

 

Staff in Grades 1-5

For staff in Grades 1-5 who participate in strike action, pay will be withheld on the basis of 1/261st of your salary. This will be calculated on a pro-rata basis for part-time staff.

These rates are based on:

Grades 1-5: working a five-day week, i.e. 261 days and their pay being apportioned over those 261 days

 

The University does not currently intend to deduct any pay from staff for action short of strike (ASOS) where ASOS is limited to working to contract. The University does not, however, accept partial performance and reserves the right to deduct up to 100% of pay if contractual obligations are not fulfilled.

The University does not currently intend to deduct any pay from staff for action short of strike (ASOS) where ASOS is limited to working to contract. The University does not, however, accept partial performance and reserves the right to deduct up to 100% of pay if contractual obligations are not fulfilled.

While the University is not obliged to maintain contributions to USS or RBP during strike action, it is proposed, as in previous strikes, that these will continue to be maintained as though you were in receipt of your full normal pay.

In relation to USS, this means that employee contributions of 9.8%, plus any additional voluntary contributions you have in place, will continue to be deducted based on your full normal pay. The University will also pay the employer contribution of 21.6% based on your full normal pay.

If you do not wish to maintain your normal USS contributions on days that you are taking strike action, you will still be covered for death in service and incapacity retirement, but you will not accrue any pension benefits on those days.

The University will plan on the basis that you wish to maintain full contributions during any period that you are taking strike action. In the event that you do not wish to maintain contributions, please email Ciara Smyth, Pensions Manager, before 30 November 2022.

In relation to RBP, this means that employee contributions of 9%, plus any additional voluntary contributions you have in place, will continue to be deducted based on your full normal pay. The University will also pay the employer contribution of 21% based on your full normal pay.

If you do not wish to maintain your normal RBP contributions on days that you are taking strike action, you will still be covered for death in service and incapacity retirement, but you will not accrue any pension benefits on those days.

The University will plan on the basis that you wish to maintain full contributions during any period that you are taking strike action. In the event that you do not wish to maintain contributions, please email Ciara Smyth, Pensions Manager, before 30 November 2022.

Pay withheld from staff who participate in industrial action will be used to fund initiatives to support students.

The University recognises and appreciates that many staff will not take strike action. Staff who participated in strike action must report their participation using the online Strike Action Form. The form will be issued to all staff; however, only colleagues who have participated in strike action will be required to complete the form.

If you are not working for any reason other than being on strike during the period of industrial action, you should ensure that your line manager is aware and has approved this absence.

Strike action is treated as unauthorised and unpaid leave; however, recent policy changes mean that unpaid absence due to industrial action does not count towards the unpaid leave limit of 4 weeks in any calendar year.

The exemption also covers reduction in salary so there will be no impact on the visa status of staff on strike.

If you have any queries in relation to this, please contact internationalstaff@qub.ac.uk