Newcastle University Strikes

National World - LocalTV

Newcastle Universities unionised academic staff and students picketed outside the King’s Gate building across from the Haymarket, in protest over plans to slash 30 million pound  in University spending, including 20 million pound on its wage bill.

Transcript

00:00Newcastle University's unionised academic staff and students picketed outside the Kingsgate

00:05building across from the Haymarket in protest over plans to slash £30m in university spending,

00:12including £20m on its wage bill. The wage cuts equate to around 300 full-time jobs.

00:18The cuts were announced following pay and promotion freezes enacted late last year after

00:22a decline in international students, which has hit universities across the country, creating

00:27a shortfall of £35m in the institution's treasury.

00:31Picker has also heard from the University and College Union General Secretary Joe Grady

00:36at Grey's Monument, alongside other guest speakers.

00:39Joe Grady said,

00:40This is not just a Newcastle issue. We've got branches in Dundee, Cardiff, Sheffield,

00:45Brunel and Durham either balloting or taking strike action over similar proposed job cuts

00:49over similar projected deficits.

00:51UK-wide, we know we've already had an announcement of over 5,000 jobs and potentially another

00:565,000 more. Yes, we are in Newcastle protesting these cuts, but this is a pattern seen across

01:02the UK.

01:04Everyone is furious that staff in higher education go above and beyond on a daily basis for students.

01:09The union boss also criticised Newcastle's university's plans to open a campus in India

01:14while proposing to cut budgets and staff.

01:17We spoke with students in Newcastle about their thoughts on these strikes.

01:21I mean, I'm fully in support of strike action personally, but I'm a bit biased in that I

01:26want to be a lecturer. So I'm seeing these job cuts happening and I'm thinking, that's

01:29my future. If I go into further education, I do my master's, I do my PhD and I become

01:33a lecturer. Well, the field is starting to cease to exist because the money isn't going

01:39to lecturers, they're getting rid of them, which means there's less teaching for postgrad

01:42students, less supervision. It obviously has the ripple impact because it's a 5% cut across

01:47all departments that's happening in Newcastle, which it's fine for the bigger departments.

01:51But for instance, the School of Philosophy, they already don't have many staff. So 5%

01:55is gutting the department. You know, philosophy will cease to exist if these cuts go through.

02:00I know I went to a meeting the other day and they were saying in geography, they've already

02:04lost like five or six members of staff. Well, students are paying £10,000 a year to study

02:10and they're losing members of staff. So they're losing teaching. The staff who remain are

02:14getting double, triple the workload. So of course I support the strikes because that's

02:18not fair. It's not fair on the people who are losing their jobs. And it's not fair on

02:22the students who are paying £10,000 to get a worse education. I know the universities

02:28have done nothing to mitigate the strike action. They say, you know, we want to make sure that

02:32you're not impacted by it, but they're not doing anything. Obviously, you can't stop

02:35the staff from striking, so the lectures aren't happening, so students aren't being taught.

02:39I think for what they want to achieve, I think it's a pretty, as a student, it doesn't really

02:46affect us too much. I think it's definitely worth it. It's only certain days a week. For

02:51example, you still want to have meetings with people, or you can't obviously go to

02:54lectures, but you can still have access to the teachers. It doesn't actually impact the

02:58studying too much.

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