Thanks to everyone who joined us for this week’s branch meeting. Below is a summary of the key issues discussed and the current state of play across several areas affecting staff conditions at BU.

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Actions for members:

• Send in your #WeAreTheUniversity ballots!
• Sign up for Academic Career Framework Consultation sessions and have your say
  • Email Niamh Downing and Mandy Matthews directly to query why the university continues to refuse staff anonymous feedback options. Want to submit your query anonymously? Send it to UCUBUOffice[at]bournemouth.ac.uk with the subject “Query for HR” and we’ll anonymise it and forward on.
• Indicate your agreement or declination of your workload in WAMS, giving a clear rationale in the box provided
• Document and report EDI concerns to your UCU reps, through the UCU inbox, and/or through our General Reporting Form (we aim to have an official UCU survey soon). A padlet link is included in the email update.

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Academic Career Framework (ACF) Consultation

We discussed the university’s current consultation on changes to the Academic Career Framework—changes that will significantly impact promotion, progression, and academic role expectations. Information sent from the DVC includes:

There will be three sessions, details can be found below. Please complete the booking form to register your place. Please note that spaces are limited and are on a first-come-first served basis.

• Thursday 27 November, 2pm to 4pm, Lansdowne Campus
• Friday 5 December, 10am to 12pm, Talbot Campus
• Thursday 11 December, 1pm to 3pm, Talbot Campus

The currently scheduled staff consultation sessions are in-person only, and have not yet been appropriately publicised. We’ve now been told one online session will be offered in the new year—after we raised accessibility concerns.

We’ve written to the university asking for:

• Online options to be added for accessibility
• An anonymous feedback route to be created (as current sessions tie attendance to named registration)
• Improved communication, including clearer subject lines and upfront announcements, not hidden inside internal bulletins

Staff have repeatedly told us that they do not feel able to give honest feedback if it is tied to their identity or if they fear being identified through attendance. While the university has stated that names are not linked to feedback, feedback is being gathered in “open workshops” where individual views are shared publicly—so this reassurance does not address the root of the concern.

So far, the university has refused to consider anonymous feedback mechanisms.

As we told the university: if you can ensure anonymous feedback from students, you can do it for staff.

We will continue pressing for accessible, transparent, and safe consultation that reflects the importance of these proposed changes.

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Workload Planning – “Published” ≠ “Agreed”

Workload remains one of the most urgent issues affecting staff. The university recently shared data showing:

• 503 of 585 staff’s workloads have been published (86%)
  • 171 staff members have approved their workloads (33% of staff with published workloads, or 29% of all staff)
  • 245 staff members have not responded to their published workloads (49% of staff with published workloads, or 42% of all staff)
  • 87 staff members have declined their published workloads (17% of staff with published workloads, or 15% of all staff)
• 83 of 585 staff’s workloads have not been published (14%)
• 84 of 585 staff’s workloads are over-allocated (14%)

What this actually means: 71% of staff (415 of 585) do not have published, negotiated, and agreed workloads as of Tuesday 11 November 2025, 7 weeks into semester 1.

Worse, 84 staff are still recorded as over-allocated, despite earlier commitments that no one should be above 100% (which includes a 5% “capacity planning” buffer). That means 14% of staff have KNOWN untenable workloads.

At this week’s Joint Interest Group (JIG) meeting, we were told again that the university has “plans” and “processes,” and that leadership are happy with them. We don’t know what these plans are or how long they will take to implement.

We also raised concerns about the lack of detail in current plans, poor systems integration (e.g. activities not feeding into WAMS), and the university’s continued failure to explain how “under-allocation” is being defined or addressed.

We are asking all members to decline your workload in WAMS (with a statement as to why in the box provided) if it is:

• Incomplete
• Inaccurate
• Over 100% (as long as it includes a 5% “capacity planning” buffer)
• Not negotiated or agreed
• Advised to be “ignored” or “waited on”

Declining a workload is a protected and factual statement—it is not misconduct, and it cannot be held against you. It tells the university that you do not accept an unsafe or unreasonable allocation of work, and prompts them to do something about it (or at least, it helps us tell them to do something about it).

We also advise members to submit a confidential stress risk assessment to the university’s Health & Wellbeing Team (staffhealthandwellbeing@bournemouth.ac.uk). This is handled separately from management and not shared beyond that team. It helps document the systemic risk we are facing—and creates a paper trail the university can’t ignore.

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Trade Dispute – A Long Way to Go

The university has provided us with a draft proposal to attempt to resolve the ongoing trade dispute. Regional officials are drafting a formal response, and we’ll keep members updated as that develops.

At the moment, however, little concrete action has been proposed to us, so for now, the trade dispute continues, and we continue to press the university for:

• A commitment to no further compulsory redundancies
• An agreed approach to future consultation on proposed redundancy dismissals or changes to working practices affecting UCU members
• Agreement on the policy framework to be used if the university is considering restructure or potential redundancies
• An agreed approach to Equality Impact Assessments, to ensure that equality and diversity implications are considered at a formative stage of any future proposed changes
• Reasonable workload expectations, aligned with contracts of employment, with sufficient time allocated to academic research activities
• Compliance with collective agreements reached with UCU, not seeking to impose changes to policies outside of the established procedures for negotiation and consultation with UCU and other recognised trade unions

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Equalities Concerns

Our EDI working group has identified a growing list of serious cases and concerns raised by members across the university. These include:

• Poor handling of disability accommodations leading to flare-ups of long-term conditions
• Discriminatory removal of EDI-related time (e.g. Athena SWAN) with no recognition of differential needs between departments
• Micromanagement and changes to teaching duties without consultation
• Staff discouraged from disclosing health conditions out of fear that their responsibilities—and career paths—will be curtailed
• Lack of anonymous reporting options, especially for Global Majority and international staff with identifiable circumstances
• Pay and progression systems that penalise those who do not feel culturally comfortable with self-promotion
• NHS surcharge costs falling on international staff without clear information on contract exchange
• Safety concerns for staff travelling in the dark during winter, particularly in the context of rising hate crime

We will be developing a branch-wide survey to gather further evidence and offer members a safer route to highlight these issues. We are also exploring formal reporting to equalities and regulatory bodies.

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We Need Your Voice

Across all these issues, one theme is consistent: when members speak collectively, the university has to listen. When we are silent—or isolated—the university assumes it can carry on with performative consultation and unchecked managerialism.

If you’ve experienced or witnessed discrimination, bullying, harassment, or similar issues, please document it and share it with us (in confidence). Without clear records or evidence, our ability to challenge systemic problems or support individual grievances is severely limited. Even short written summaries or saved emails can make a crucial difference. We can’t act on what we don’t know—and the university won’t change what it can’t be held accountable for. Further, we can’t escalate systemic concerns damaging our university to external bodies without evidence.

We’re here to protect your rights, your health, and your jobs. But we can’t do it without you.

• Decline unsafe workloads.
• Submit your risk assessment.
• Vote in the industrial action ballot.
• Document concerns.

Together is how we win. #WeARETheUniversity

In solidarity,
BU UCU Executive Committee