On strike! I’m participating in industrial action.

[painting by Mona Edulesco]

As some of you may know I am employee of a big, super old University in the UK. As some of you may also know, I am a member of the University and College Union. I, along with colleagues throughout the UK, have been participating in industrial action over the past two months in an effort to save our pensions and generally push back against the forces of casualisation, commercialisation, and neoliberalism in higher education.  Good luck, right?

See: https://www.ucu.org.uk/why-we-are-taking-action-over-USS

On days that I am not on strike, I am participating in action short of strike. Specifically I am working to contract, meaning all those 60 hour academic weeks that I’m not paid for are just not happening at the moment. That means no blog, no Culture Crime News, no extras that are my job but that take time that my job doesn’t pay me for. Instead I’m weaving a basket, talking to my family, and getting angry enough on Twitter to be quoted in The Guardian.

When will Culture Crime News be back? Probably when I once again feel like my “working double the hours I am paid for” is appreciated by the very people who don’t think I and my fellow university employees deserve a workable pension, real contracts, or pay raises that even come near to inflation. Watch this space.