UCU responds to HEFCE future of higher education report

Responding to 'The higher education workforce framework 2010', commissioned by the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE), the union said the report identified many of the key issues that higher education needed to respond to, but was in danger of trying to begin the debate from the wrong starting point.
 
UCU said it was pleased that the report recognised the high-quality workforce, characterised by excellence, creativity and innovation that has delivered outstanding results at national and international levels for English universities. The union welcomed the report's widespread support for current national bargaining arrangements and the nationally-bargained Framework Agreement, but added that HEFCE had to ensure the trade unions were involved in discussions on the main issues facing the sector like job security, student expectations, organisational change and workforce planning.

'There is much we can agree on its diagnosis of the key issues. However... the suggested solutions were largely based on jargon and buzzwords drawn from unsupported management theories.'
Michael MacNeil
UCU head of higher education

UCU head of higher education, Michael MacNeil, said: 'HEFCE has produced a thought-provoking report. There is much we can agree on its diagnosis of the key issues that all of us involved in higher education need to tackle. However, it is the prescription offered by some of the commentators that we have major difficulty with. Although many of the sector's challenges in the report were supported by evidence, the suggested solutions were largely based on jargon and buzzwords drawn from unsupported management theories.  
 
'The report indicates high levels of support for national bargaining, yet those commissioning the report have insisted on asking questions to kick off the debate that could destabilise the sector and lead to a worsening of industrial relations. At the moment we need to be able to engage in a national dialogue about the key challenges facing higher education. It would be reckless to do anything that undermined national arrangements, especially in the current climate as they offer the best protection for staff and universities.
 
'It is of considerable concern that the report contains a contradiction between the recognition that the sector performs outstandingly well on the international stage and some commentators' obsession with ill-defined notions of performance management.'