We held an open members’ meeting this Wednesday which was well-attended & lively.
We had excellent contributions about the current Pay, Equality, and Pracarity ballot from Executive committee members:

• Steven Stanley (read his blog post on how the USS strike links up with the current dispute); and
• Rowan Campbell (read her blog post about the conditions of precarious workers here at Cardiff).

We also talked about how you, as members can help campaign on this issue by attending school-level meetings, knocking on doors with your dep reps, and just talking with colleagues about the pressing issues we’re fighting on.

We also agreed to support today’s strike in the fast food industry.

The main points boil down to:

• We’re being balloted on strike and non-strike action along with all other UK UCU and Unison members, on the pressing issues of stagnant pay, equality (including the gender pay gap) and casualization. Read about this in more detail.
• If you haven’t voted yet, the UCU nationally and at Cardiff are recommending you vote “Yes” to strike action and action short of a strike. We’ve produced an FAQ. If you’ve got any questions not answered here please email them to ucu@cardiff.ac.uk and we’ll add them to the list.
• If you haven’t had your postal ballot paper, threw it out by accident, or lost it under a pile of stuff, you can request a new one – the closing date’s approaching (19^th Oct), so do this soon!
• Please log in, and update all your details, on the My UCU website (you’ll need your UCU number & your password) – if we take industrial action and this info is incorrect (even if you have an old workplace listed, or your School/division’s name has changed the employers can take legal action and have the strike declared illegal). This is super important.