Support the university strikes

Text of a Socialist Party Scotland leaflet

Socialist Party Scotland offers our full support to university workers taking strike action at unis across Scotland.

Hundreds of jobs are at threat at Scotland’s universities. This has led directly to strike action by union members, including at Strathclyde, Dundee, Heriot Watt and Aberdeen this week in response.

All parts of the university employees are at threat; from estates and security staff, lecturers, technicians and cleaners are all facing job cuts and attacks on pay and terms and conditions at work.

It is testimony to the strength of feeling that trade unionists have voted in favour of strike action

Strathclyde

Unite members are taking a week-long strike at Strathclyde Uni against plans to slash 76 full-time posts, as a result of a £35m funding gap. This is despite reserves of close to half a billion pounds.

As Unite the union has said: “There remains exorbitant executive pay levels at Strathclyde and it’s not lost on our members that there are no proposals to attack this by management. That’s why our members have no option but to fight against such double standards and to take action to protect all jobs at Strathclyde.”

UCU members have also been on strike for two days as well.

Heriot Watt

UCU members are also on strike this week as a result of the threat of compulsory redundancy.

Dundee

Striking for two days this week, hundreds of UCU members are angry over 180 planned redundancies and the gross injustice of the university at the same time advertising for higher fat-cat levels of salaries for executive roles. This comes on top off hundreds of job losses over the last few years, a result of underfunding and the incompentence of management.

Aberdeen

UCU members are on strike for 4 days over management’s plans to make cuts to jobs and their refusal to rule out the use of compulsory redundancies.

As well as thousands of job losses, university staff have also seen a real terms pay cut of 30% since 2011. While University bosses are raking in hundreds of thousands a year in salaries, workers are not even being offered a cost of living increase.

There’s a widespread and deepening crisis in higher education funding in Scotland. 43% of universities were in deficit at the end of the 2024 – 2025 period. Others are seeking to make workers pay the price for years of underfunding, casualisation and cuts.

As a result, trade unions have been leading the way in organising strike action. As well as Strathclyde, Dundee and Aberdeen, unions at UWS, and Robert Gordon have also been on strike. A national day of strike action across all unions in all affected universities would also be a step forward in applying political pressure to bear.

For students it also means cutbacks to student support services and quality of their courses. The crisis is being driven by a more than a decade of cuts by the Scottish government combined with the partial collapse of the funding model that relies on international students studying in Scotland paying exorbitant fees.

Action committees of trade unions and students in each institution affected are also essential. A central demand should be the full funding of higher education by the Scottish government.

Sack the bosses – for the democratic running of unis

Socialist Students and Socialist Party Scotland also call for the removal of top university management and for the running of universities by democratically elected committees of staff, students and the local community in the interests of society as a whole, not to make profit for wealthy investors and pay vice chancellors’ bloated salaries.

Of course, the lack of a political alternative makes it easier for Labour, the SNP and all the capitalist parties to pass the buck off to one another. A new mass workers’ party could immediately change this by declaring common cause with student and campus staff and campaigning for a fully funded education system – without fees and cuts.

We are standing for Holyrood as part of the Scottish Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition.Enormous profits are extracted from the products of publicly funded research, and this money should help open more spaces for working class students instead of lining the bosses’ pockets.

Equally, further education will prove invaluable in dealing with pressing problems such as the housing crisis or the need for a socialist transition to reduce carbon emissions. Both of these problems require more vocational training in construction and engineering.

Students and staff should be preparing now for the fight for a fully funded education system. And that means a break with capitalism. We fight for a socialist education system, not underfunded and crumbling unis and colleges.