Bargaining hunt

After the marking and assessment boycott, what is the future of national pay negotiations?

Just over two weeks ago, the Universities and Colleges Employers Association suspended Queen’s University Belfast for three years after the Northern Irish institution declared it had reached a local agreement on pay and conditions, bringing to an end the marking and assessment boycott at the university.

On 28 June, QUB announced it had reached an agreement with its local University and College Union branch, heralding the industrial action-busting deal as the “first settlement of its kind”. This did not go down well with national pay bargainers on both sides of the negotiating table, and on 11 July, Ucea announced it had kicked Queen’s out.