Petition to the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Simone Buitendijk, concerning the forthcoming ‘town hall meetings' on the University’s support of the UUK cuts to USS pensions (599 signatures to date)
We, the undersigned, note your communication to all staff of 4 March, in which you stated that you were to arrange a series of ‘town hall meetings’ to facilitate ‘an open, respectful conversation’ about the recent substantial cuts to retirement income from the USS pension scheme. We note that in your message you use the word ‘explain’ six times, and the word ‘listen’ once. We would nonetheless respectfully request the following of these forthcoming meetings
       
- That they are ‘conversations’, by which we understand that we can put questions to you, which you will seek to answer during the meeting, as is understood by the ‘town hall meeting’ convention.
- That these conversations are ‘open’, and that you will not restrict who can ask questions, or who has access to the answers.
- That you invite a UCU pensions representative to explain the position adopted by UCU to the same broad constituency of USS members whom they are legally mandated to represent.
- That you explain why it is that, when the USS Trustees made available interim valuations that demonstrated the asset value to be trending around £90 b n (enough to define a surplus if the USS applied the same metrics employed at the 2011, 2014, 2017, 2018 and 2020 valuations), you still supported a UUK proposal predicated on the £66.5 bn valuation of 2020, calculated at the worst moment during the Covid economic crisis, when the consequence of this required staff members, not universities, to make up that no-longer present deficit with their income in retirement.
- That you explain why, after the USS trustees indicated that the UCU proposals were ‘viable and implementable’, our University posted a response that queried whether they were viable or implementable, and detailed two points of ‘lack of clarity’ and one of timetable, when these matters had already been fully and clearly outlined by UCU to the satisfaction of the USS.
- That you explain why, seemingly contrary to the University’s Values and the Code of Practice of Corporate Governance, the University has supported the UUK in its manipulation of the JNC process, possibly in breach of the USS scheme rules.
- That you explain why the University did not perform an Equality Impact Assessment to inform its Council’s decision, or why they have not undertaken one since to consider the impact of that decision on its staff.
- That you explain why the University has promoted the UUK misinformation that the UUK cuts to the USS pension represents around 10% to 18% for most members, when it is a matter of public knowledge that these statistics are selectively constructed and misleading if wielded without context. (The origin on the 10% to 18% statistic has been clearly explained and refuted with empirical evidence).
- That you explain why the University, on the same internal staff-facing pages, has suggested that the UUK proposals are to avoid potential increases to contributions (‘misinformation that instils fear’) even when recent USS interim valuations indicate such contribution increases are highly unlikely, and that those same pages do not explain that the UCU proposals guaranteed a limit on any future contributions.
- That the same internal staff-facing pages offer a link to a historic calculator of what would happen if the UUK proposals ‘did not go ahead’ (‘misinformation that instils fear’) given that this denies the existence of the equally mitigating UCU proposals as an alternative mode of avoiding such increases.
- That you explain why the University has not opposed the UUK’s seeming breach of their duty to act in good faith.
- That you explain what you mean by ‘misinformation that instils fear’ in communications from our UCU representatives, and invite those representatives to respond.
- That you explain why the University of Leeds Council was informed that there had been no UCU proposal tabled at the August JNC, when such a proposal did exist, had been costed by USS, circulated to UUK and on the agenda for that meeting of the JNC.
- That you explain why, as one of the largest USS employers in the country, you are powerless, as you claim, to influence UUK on this issue.
- That you explain why the University has supported the UUK in refusing the same covenant support package to any of the UCU proposals, despite that covenant cost being the same whichever package it underpinned.

The petition has 599 signatories: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1M-sqyimvhDHHv8GNsnQd1-9wvmgkCr8R8BnTWpW7Kzw/edit?usp=sharing

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