UCU: The use of subsidiary companies by HEIs to circumvent TPS

Motion

Motion text: Congress notes:
1. that many post-1992 HEIs ‘parent’ wholly or majority-owned subsidiary companies (incorporated under UK company law) to operate non-charitable and commercial activities to avoid compromising the charitable objects of the HEI.
2. and condemns the shameful employment practice of using a subsidiary company to employ new staff (academic and professional services) at the Universities of Falmouth, Staffordshire, and Solent for the purpose of circumventing the commitment to Teachers’ Pension Scheme (TPS).
Congress instructs the NEC to:
a. establish a working group to specifically to defend TPS
b. organise a high profile campaign for the abolition of the shameful employment practice of using a subsidiary company for the purposes of employing new staff and to circumvent TPS and LGPS (Local Government Pension Scheme)
c. provide support and resources to post-92 branches.
d. Call for equal funding of post 92-TPS from the government.
e. Campaign to end the outsourcing in HEIs so that staff (this disproportionately affects equality strands and casualised workers) are not pressured into inferior pension schemes in subsidiary employment or in traditional HEIs.
f. A renewed campaign and focus on pension justice in TPS for women on all contracts.