Staff at a Fife rural college have been on strike in a row over pay.
More than half of the teaching staff at Scotland’s Rural University College (SRUC) Elmwood campus in Cupar have taken industrial action.
Lecturers were on strike on Tuesday as part of a series of industrial action across Scotland in the coming weeks.
They have asked for a pay rise, saying they are given less money than lecturers in other further and higher education settings.
Action was agreed at a recent ballot with 86% voting for strike action.
Strikes will be held once a week until Christmas. Any action beyond that date will need to be agreed through a second ballot.
Lecturers will strike on a different day each week to avoid individual classes or students being disproportionately disrupted.
Gary Anderson, a programme leader at Elmwood and the campus’ EIS secretary, said: “Staff are on different rates of pay here at SRUC.
“We want them to match pay to other colleagues and to other lecturers in other universities across Scotland.”
Strike action ‘needs to be done’
He claimed SRUC bosses said they will “get round” to sorting out pay issues but nothing has changed, prompting the industrial action.
Most of those taking part in are members of the union EIS, some however are not.
Gary added: “We are pleased with the support from the whole union membership.
“It is frustrating that we have had to do this but felt that this needs to be done to move the conversation forward.”
Staff at Elmwood created picket lines outside the campus on Tuesday morning, with Gary saying they create a “virtual picket line” in the afternoon for staff working from home.
Larry Flanagan, EIS general secretary, said: “Lecturers at SRUC are not taking strike action lightly, but have been left little choice given the intransigence of management and its refusal to negotiate a fair pay offer to members.
“Pay for lecturers at SRUC has fallen significantly behind the norms across both the further and higher education sectors and it is time for management to stop procrastinating and pay their lecturers fairly for the work they do.
“It is clear that our members remain strong and committed and picket lines will be in place at all SRUC campuses.”
A spokesperson for Scotland’s Rural College said: “We are disappointed by the actions of the EIS leadership.
“We have made strong progress in these areas and EIS have been involved and consulted every step of the way.
“We encourage the EIS to re-engage with our agreed internal dispute mechanism, including the ongoing offer of external mediation to resolve any specific concerns they may have.
‘Fully committed to a review of pay and grading’
“We are fully committed to a review of pay and grading, which has already started.
“We have made a significant offer to our trade union partners on a pay increase for all employees for 2021/2022.
“In July 2019 SRUC agreed to conduct a review of pay and grading with our three trade unions. Legal advice that followed stated that as a starting point any pay and grading review must be underpinned by a rigorous job evaluation process. The only significant delay since then was due to the global pandemic and a joint arrangement to pause while all parties responded to the crisis.
“In April 2021, SRUC in collaboration with trade unions – including EIS – restarted the project with a joint procurement exercise to appoint a pay and grading specialist consultancy.
“In July we completed this process with agreement from all to award the contract for this work to ECC a not-for-profit consortium of higher and further education organisations and a leader for job evaluation and pay and grading. Work began immediately to prepare a project plan and framework.
“The approach set out has been widely used across the HE/FE sector by 140 organisations and has evaluated the roles of more than half a million employees. This is a tried and tested approach. All the expert advice is that this process will take close to two years.
“Last week, these documents were presented to our three trade unions. EIS were aware of the timeframe to develop these documents and our wish to work on this project in collaboration with our trade unions to develop the specifics.
“We have always engaged openly and fairly with our trade unions partners and our doors remain open. We look forward to working with them to discuss what’s best for employees, students, and the future of SRUC.”