As university staff are set to take strike action, two lecturers, Des Freedman and Vladimir Unkovski-Korica explain why you should support the strike

Download the leaflet below.

Higher education workers in at least 61 universities are planning 14 days of strike action to stop cuts to our pensions. We need your support.

The universities want individual pension pots which are gambled on the stock market and where risk is borne by members of staff and not institutions. A new lecturer could lose some £208,000 of retirement income.

This is a very political dispute. It is about not just about loss of income, it is not even just about privatising risk; it is about preparing universities for full entry into a higher education market where the richest institutions don’t carry liabilities on behalf of the poorest and most vulnerable.

The dispute has been engineered in order to suit the imperial ambitions of a handful of the biggest universities to operate freely in a ‘competitive’ university system.

This is why everyone, other staff members, everyone who cares about education, and especially students, need to get behind the lecturers as they take action. This is a fight for the future of a publicly run education system.

It takes place at a time when public opinion has turned against the free market dogma that has wrecked so many public services. The majority now want an end to fees for students, more resources pumped into the NHS and our school system, and proper taxation on the super rich and the tax dodging corporates to pay for it.

We have a generational chance for change. But the establishment will do everything they can to block it. It will take concerted action to make it happen. That is why we have taken the decision to strike, and that is we ask for your support.

Download the leaflet to give out on picket lines, at your work places, trade union, local party meetings etc here.

Download the petition here.