Higher Education members – support FE members on strike on 10th November – by UCU President, Liz Lawrence

On Tuesday 10th November UCU’s FE members will be taking strike action. This is over the failure of the employers to make a pay offer for 2015. HE members may feel insulted at getting a pay offer of only 1% for 2015. The employers in FE have refused to make an offer at all. This is a deliberate provocation.

Please show your support for your Further Education colleagues. Please make solidarity visits to their picket lines, attend local strike rallies and take a collection for hardship funds. Please show that we value FE and value our FE members, even if the employers do not.

Adult and Further Education are being clobbered more and more by funding cuts. Already the Adult Education sector has faced 25% funding cuts. More are in the pipeline. This is leading to loss of many areas of educational provision, including ESOL courses. The future of this valuable sector of education is being put into question.

Many Higher Education members know the value to society of the FE sector. We know that for some university students the route to Higher Education has come via the FE college and access courses. The current trade dispute over pay occurs in a context of savage funding cuts to the FE sector. Too many of the politicians in Westminster have never been inside an FE college and do not know the contribution FE makes to society. We need to support the fightback to defend the FE sector.

by UCU President, Dr.Liz Lawrence

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