UCU: Campaign against use of 'open ended' contracts with review date

Motion

Motion title: Campaign against use of 'open ended' contracts with review date

Motion text: Congress notes that:
1. members are rightly concerned about redundancies among permanent staff, but for casualised workers, hidden redundancies are business as usual.
2. there is widespread use of 'open ended contracts with review date'; contracts that sound secure, yet offer minimal job security, cause stress and anxiety, and lead to hidden redundancies.
3. while these contracts (also called 'permanent finite', 'open ended fixed term') fulfill employers' legal obligations, in reality these fake open ended contracts do not offer more job security, leaving workers trapped in precarious employment situations for many years.
Congress resolves to:
a. campaign against the use of open ended/review date contracts by suggesting alternative approaches
b. move employees onto permanent contracts, providing much needed stability to the HE sector
c. establish pools of researchers, to share work between existing employees
d. make bridging funds available to avoid compulsory redundancies due to gaps in external funding
e. call out employers' misuse of these damaging and misleading contracts.