Month: March 2025

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Open Union Meetings for APM, O&F and TS Roles

OPEN TO ALL STAFF: MEETINGS TO DISCUSS;

  • Future Nottingham
  • Possible restructures
  • Financial position
  • Next steps

    This is on behalf of all 3 University of Nottingham Unions and thus all job levels 1 – 7 for Administrative, Professional and Managerial (APM), Technical Services (TS), and Operations & Facilities (O&F).

    Both dates will be online (Join using your UoN account):

    Tuesday April 1st 3pm-4pm
    Thursday April 3rd 9.30am-10.30am
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UCU has reported UoN to HSE re: workload and stress prevention breaches

Email sent to members on Friday 21st March 2025

Dear members

We wanted to let you know that after asking for stress prevention documentation for several months, the UCU Branch Committee made the decision to report UoN to HSE for workload and stress breaches. Below is the summary of what we told HSE:

  • Already over 30 requests for caseworker support this year, a sharp increase to the comparative time period in previous years.
  • High levels of “stress and worry regarding work” identified in the 2023-4 Specialist Wellbeing Services report.
  • Failure to produce stress risk assessment and business unit level stress risk assessments despite repeated requests from September 2024.
  •  A sloppy and hastily completed Institution Level Risk Assessment finally shared last week, without any dialogue with UCU.  It is inadequate as it needs to be supported by Business Unit Stress Risk Assessments, which are not in place. It includes Future Nottingham as a stress mitigating factor.
  • UCU workload reps were told that risk assessments have been delayed due to workload issues amongst administrative and professional staff
  • Most academic staff have a “workload model” which in many cases is calculated as over 100% i.e. a staff member contracted to work full time is required to complete more work than can be expected within their contracted hours. Within university policy, workload up to 120% is considered within normal range, with no rationale for this, despite numerous requests.
  • There is no evidence of equality impact assessment for workload models and no mitigations put in place for disabled colleagues, exacerbating increased vulnerability to stress.                 

The UCU branch considers that there is substantial unmitigated risk to workload-related health. The branch is also concerned by an anticipated increase in the number and severity of cases of work-related stress, stress-related ill health and serious mental health problems among employees.

We will keep you posted on developments with HSE. In the meantime, if you are struggling with work-related stress, ask your line manager for an Individual Stress Risk Assessment. Please come to the weekly workload support drop-ins, for advice and guidance on just saying ‘no!’ to unsustainable workloads. Check the weekly branch newsletter for dates and times of these. We will be in touch soon to ask for testimonials on your workload and stress experiences. You are not on your own with this. 

Your Workload Working Group

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UoN UCU Motions for 2025 UCU Congress

The following motions were passed with large majorities by members at the well-attended meeting on Wednesday 12th March.

Motions for Congress

1. Reporting back of NEC members to constituencies

Congress instructs the NEC to formulate rule change motions to ensure
the following:

  1. NEC members canvass opinions from branches and regions in their
    constituencies prior to NEC and NEC subcommittee meetings.
  2. NEC members produce a written report within two working weeks of
    NEC and NEC subcommittees to be circulated in the appropriate
    constituency.
  3. Appropriate mechanisms to be established by UCU to support
    circulation of reports from NEC members to constituencies.

Rule Change Motions for Congress

2. Change to Rule 16

Add new rule 16.5.1

Where National Congress or Sector Conferences do not meet during the times referred to in rule 16.5, the relevant National Congress or Sector Conferences must be recalled as soon as reasonably practicable to consider the motions submitted to the National Congress or Sector Conferences. Additional late and emergency motions can be considered at the recalled Congress or Sector Conference in line with rules 16.8 and 16.9.

Purpose:
To enshrine in rule that in the event of cancellation, Congress or Sector Conference need to be rescheduled. Rather than, as has happened when the rules were silent on the matter, motions disappear into a void in spite of the hard work submitting bodies undertook to compose them and the efforts of elected delegates to prepare to debate them.

3. Change to regional committee standing orders –
Environmental Representative

To Standing order 7 of the UCU Regional Committee Model Standing Orders, add ‘an Environmental representative’ after ‘a representative of members on casual contracts’

So the amended Model Standing Order 7 would read:

Treasurer, the Secretary and the Chairs and Secretaries of the sector committees, and for each sector, a representative of members on casual contracts, an Environmental representative together with such other Officers as may be deemed necessary.

Purpose:
The importance of environmental issues and the seriousness of climate change means that there should be an Environmental representative on regional committees. The rule change will add one.