We’re not just striking for lecturers, or even just for UCU members. We’re striking for everyone in HE. Our four fights (pay, casualisation, workload, and gender pay gap), when won, will benefit current and future staff, students, and professional support staff.

One area that isn’t talked about enough is the gender pay gap. Most of the gender pay gap in HE isn’t a simple case of men earning more for doing the same work (which is illegal). It’s a rat’s nest of complicating factors that include:

• More men than women in management
• More men than women promoted to higher roles such as Professor
• Fewer men than women in lower-grade roles, such as Grade 6 professional support roles
• Men being less likely to take or need part-time roles and contracts (and conversely, HE failing to offer part-time contracts for higher-paid roles such as management or profs)
• Men taking less care-related leave

BU UCU is continuing to work on all these areas, of course, but one area that stands out is HE’s continued restriction of professional support roles to lower-grade roles, as well as offering few to no opportunities for promotion. Unlike academic roles, professional support staff can only apply for pay progression, not promotion, unless someone in a higher position vacates the role. Imagine not being able to apply for promotion until everyone in line ahead of you retires or moves elsewhere.

Professional support staff do amazing work. They run trainings, organise grant proposals, generate budgets, maintain our IT systems, and so much more, keeping all the wheels turning. The latest trend to “centralise” support systems has seen them made redundant and taking on more and more workload. And no matter how hard they work, they don’t have the same promotion-for-contribution system that academics do, which not only disadvantages women in the pay system, it contributes to “brain drain” as these highly capable workers leave HE for better opportunities for their skills elsewhere.

UNISON, UCU’s sister union, supports our colleagues in admin, IT, cleaning, facilities, security, libraries, sports centres, and student support. When you post to socials and march on pickets about improving conditions in HE, don’t forget our support colleagues who make so much happen in our universities.