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220902 UCU Rising Bernie Sanders Jo Grady.jpg

UCU Rising: This is how we win

2 September 2022

Next week is the big one. You will be finally receiving your ballots from Wednesday 7 September for the biggest industrial action in the history of higher education. With our comrades in the CWU on strike on Thursday and Friday, you may not receive yours right away but when you do we need you to rip that envelope open and vote YES straight away. 

From today, you should be receiving a home mailing through your door with some more information from me on why we are taking this action and why it is so important that you vote YES from Wednesday onwards. As part of the pack you are receiving an 'I'm voting YES' poster--we are asking you to take a selfie of yourself with the poster and upload it to social media with the hashtag #ucuRISING. We are also running a competition for the best pet picture with the poster, for a chance for your pet to be featured on our next round of stickers.  

Next Tuesday 6 September at 20:00 we will be hosting the most important UCU LIVE event of the entire campaign. We need every single one of you watching live via YouTube, Facebook or Twitter, flooding the comments section with positive statements, showing the size and power of this union and how you are going to channel your rightful anger into the biggest YES vote in this union's history.

Your employer is absolutely terrified about the impact of a huge YES vote in this ballot. That is why we have had the Universities and Colleges Employers Association (UCEA) scouring our website for material to try and discredit our ballot and allege interference by the union. It is vitally important that we do not undermine all of our hard work by giving the employers any reason to try and discredit us. So when you receive your ballot remember to vote in private at home and to not touch anyone else's ballot paper. 

We are going to win this ballot. Not just by a vote, not just by a few percentage points. We are going to absolutely smash the threshold and bring every university in the country to a standstill for the first time in our union's history. 

In Solidarity

Jo Grady 
UCU general secretary

Last updated: 28 September 2022