Patricia Prieto Blanco

Patricia Prieto Blanco for Migrant Members (EU)

I work as a Lecturer in Digital Media Practice at Lancaster University. My research has focused on the ways transnational families use photography in contexts of kinship and migration. This has added to my understanding of issues facing migrant workers. 

My UCU experience and involvement includes: 

  • Co-President Lancaster University UCU 
  • Health and Safety Representative Lancaster University UCU 
  • Migrant Member Rep UCU North West Regional Committee 
  • Secretary Lancaster University UCU (past) 
  • Departamental Rep Lancaster UCU (past) 
  • Departmental Rep Brighton University UCU (past) 
  • Member UCU Left 

UCU members in post-16 education are experiencing redundancies, intolerable workloads, lack of job security and pay offers which do not compensate for inflation. We need unity of all members to tackle these problems and build up strong UK-wide bargaining arrangements which can defend the education sector and our jobs. We need viable industrial action strategies which can unify members and put sufficient pressure on employers to produce meaningful offers. I know from the experience of being a member of two active UCU branches (Brighton and Lancaster) that a well-organised branch can make a real difference in the workplace. 

I have been involved in equality issues for well over a decade in four different countries (Spain, Germany, Ireland and the UK), and I have worked on migrant issues in the UK via UCU for the last five years. Recently at Lancaster UCU we have managed to delay for almost a year the introduction of a damaging overseas work policy, and amended it to serve migrant staff members’ better. 

Migrant worker members are often vulnerable to precarious employment. We face extra costs for working in the UK: visa fees, NHS surcharge, etc. Some migrant worker members face intersectional discrimination in relation to ethnicity, race, religion. I am standing for the role of migrant rep in the NEC elections. I do so because I believe that working together with sister unions, and NUS, we need to change the narrative surrounding migration: bad employers and over a decade of austerity are to be blamed for decimated public services, not migrants. We migrants make the UK a diverse, vibrant, and engaging place to study, work, and live. Most of us decolonise by default wherever we go. 

I would like to change this with your help. We need a campaign to raise awareness of the impossible situations migrant members face day in and day out. We need to bargain for decent support and financial help from employers, and we need to do this together as one, not in local silos. We need to work closely with national, regional, and local organisations resisting the growing hostile environment migrants face in the UK. Vote for me and let’s envision an intersectionally equitable future together.