Festive message from the Interim Vice-Chancellor of University of London
In an all-staff email dated 13 December 2018, Professor Peter Kopelman attacks the Independent Workers Union of Great Britain (IWGB) and defends outsourcing facilities services
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From: Fiona Bernardone on behalf of Vice Chancellor
Sent: Thursday, December 13, 2018 10:19:13 AM
To: Central-University
Subject: Message from the Vice-ChancellorDear Colleagues
When practising as a physician I appreciate and respect evidence prior to any judgement. Similarly, an evidence base must support operating plans and strategies in higher education.
My recent experiences at the University have confirmed the importance of its academic activities to the wider community. Three graduation ceremonies (RCSSD, Heythrop and SAS) confirmed how students take great pride in a degree from the University, and a celebration of the 70th anniversary of the University of West Indies underlined the continuing links with international universities that were established through the awards of UoL external degrees. Last week I was in Paris to meet with colleagues from member institutions, UK embassy, British Council staff, and Parisians who share the regard for the importance and opportunities for ULIP post Brexit — whatever Brexit may mean. We should be rightly proud of the University’s continuing academic status as we develop our strategic plan for 2019–2024.
What I find particularly galling is how easy it has become to disseminate falsehoods and misinformation about the University through social media with no apparent questions or challenge from an academic community. I refer to the allegations made by some members of the IWGB against the University as part of their ongoing campaign to bring outsourced workers in house, which has led to a small number of university UCU branches support a call to boycott Senate House. The intention is to damage our good reputation and pressurise us into making hasty decisions without consideration of evidence. The recent correspondence from IWGB to me I consider unprofessional and unnecessarily hostile. The University has published on our website a response to their allegations here and provided the evidence to counter the extremely misleading information. I have additionally written to our UCU Regional Officer to express the University’s profound disappointment at the decision taken by the seven UCU branches, including five within the University of London federation, to express support for a boycott of Senate House.
Through our regular updates we have endeavoured to promote a shared understanding of the reasoning behind the Board of Trustee’s support for the University’s plan for bringing contracted services in-house over time. I am sure you will appreciate that this is not a simple or straightforward matter; and that our overriding responsibility must be to ensure business continuity with a sustainable workforce for the future. To do this we need to plan carefully and prudently in order to manage the practical implications of ending contracts and bringing services in-house both for affected individuals, and the University.
By way of illustration, my meetings with staff working within our contracted out services have confirmed the desire of many for continued job flexibility and of the understandable importance of take home pay.
Analysis conducted as part of the FM review, estimated the additional annual cost of bringing in house all currently contracted out services on a like for like basis to be around £3m, at a time when we are currently projecting an operating budget deficit for this academic year. To place this figure into context, each £1m represents around 20 FTE university posts, an additional 2200 UoLWW students or a 60% increase in SAS tuition fees based on current student numbers.
It is primarily for these reasons that I believe it is incumbent on us to not act precipitously. Our timeline is therefore informed both by the need to develop a thorough understanding of the impact of bringing services in-house on those individuals working within them, which we will do through the Equality Impact Assessments we have and will be conducting; and through a need to ensure that we are proceeding in a way that is affordable and in way that does not compromise the financial health of the University.
On a final note, I think it is important not to lose sight of the fact that the University is not alone in the sector in having outsourced facilities services. Separate to my point above, you will appreciate the increasingly difficult financial circumstances that our sector is likely to face in coming months, including the likely outcome from the Auger report on student tuition fees and the as yet unknown future of USS pension contributions, and Brexit. You will also no doubt appreciate OFS’s requirement for all universities to ensure that their budgetary plans support the continuation of academic excellence essential for students and researchers of today and for the future.
I apologise for posting such a sombre message pre-Christmas but I feel duty bound to outline to you the evidence to support our actions that address our duty of care for all staff, rather than being misled by ill-informed rhetoric. Should you have any questions please do contact me.
I do hope that 2019 will bring us together closer as we embark on developing our new University strategy. We need to focus efforts on strengthening even further our academic activities and our critical relationships with member institutions at home and across the world. Each of our academics plays a pivotal role in promoting our University’s proud history and achievements as well as our continuing national and global reach in the promotion of higher education. I look forward to working with you on these developments. There will be special staff focus groups formed to gather your input and feed into this work.
I wish you all a restful and enjoyable Christmas and a successful 2019.
Peter Kopelman
