You’ll Thank Me Later: the essential role of union health and safety representatives, but let’s not ignore the career benefits too.

By Neil Allison, a UCU Glasgow caseworker and one of UCU Glasgow’s Health and Safety representatives

This blog post will hopefully be informative on the relevance of health and safety (H&S) to every university worker, and the role of trade unions in supporting staff and challenging H&S issues. If you make it to the end, you’ll understand that the role of a union H&S representative (rep) may also have career benefits.

Introduction

What if we said that H&S is

• Not dull
• Not just about electrical items (PAT tested?), fire risks, yellow signs about wet floors, and other physical injury hazards and employer’s liability for those?

What if we said that H&S at a university is as much, if not more, about

• work stress
• mental health impacts of stress and, in more serious cases, psychiatric injury; about risks and liabilities for employers when staff have too much work, are bullied, are subjected to processes that are unfair, or perhaps are just managed badly?
• A tool for evidence-informed and legitimate (in the legal sense) responses to possible job losses and ideologies of austerity FOMO?

Stress and mental health is the number one health hazard in the modern workplace.

“Stress, depression or anxiety and musculoskeletal disorders [bad desk set ups for example] accounted for the majority of days lost due to work-related ill health in 2024/25”

https://www.hse.gov.uk/statistics/dayslost.htm

Stress is also a massive part of UCU H&S reps’ remit. The legal framework provides a powerful tool to help promote positive workplace changes and resist negative ones. Not only that, but as you’ll see later, being a UCU H&S rep can also advance your career.

What is the relationship between everyday stresses, legal duties under Health and Safety

First things first. As a H&S rep you have the right to paid time off as necessary to perform your function. While I’ve never had difficulties or arguments regarding this in practice, the law is very supportive of the health and safety rep’s functions.

At root, the functions come from the statutory duty of care under the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 and subsequent legislation. Employers need to take reasonably practical steps to protect the health, safety and welfare of employees.

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE), set up to promote and police H&S, most clearly demonstrates the everyday health risks to a typical university employee under its management standards (not hard law, but very influential and expressly referred to by Glasgow University’s own Policy for Managing Stress in the Workplace https://www.gla.ac.uk/myglasgow/safetyresilience/managingstresspolicy/ )

These standards identify 6 categories of hazard that can lead to health risks:

• Demands – this includes issues such as workload, work patterns and the work environment
• Control – how much say the person has in the way they do their work
• Support – this includes the encouragement, sponsorship and resources provided by the organisation, line management and colleagues
• Relationships – this includes promoting positive working to avoid conflict and dealing with unacceptable behaviour
• Role – whether people understand their role within the organisation and whether the organisation ensures that they do not have conflicting roles
• Change – how organisational change (large or small) is managed and communicated in the organisation

https://www.hse.gov.uk/stress/standards/overview.htm

As an example, noting a hazard from organisational change such as staff-cuts that you believe may lead to overwork for remaining staff, can be raised with management at various levels under H&S to recommend risk assessment. Another example might be addressing the lack of a workload planner, which could fall under several categories of H&S such as demands, role, or even control, the possible risks being stress and ill-health, not knowing when you can say “no”, not understanding how you can re-prioritise work, etc.

Once you, as H&S rep, identify a health hazard, whether that’s a dodgy plug or overwork, you can prompt a risk assessment and even provide your own elements you want factored into their assessment e.g. by highlighting to management that an employee is suffering from stress, they’ve been to their GP who has diagnosed consequent health concerns, or, on a more systemic level, highlighting absence from work figures at University school level as part of a H&S work stress inspection. I have been involved in both in recent year. I’ve helped individuals secure immediate reasonably practical changes, and in respect of a university school, helped the school put together an action plan to combat stress. Another example of a systemic issue/H&S concern in recent years has been the student and staff complaints mechanisms and how they operate at a university-wide level.

The employer’s duty to take reasonably practical steps in response to identified risks from hazards does introduce a proportionality element, so it’s not so straightforward that the employer must address the hazard, but the employer will usually explain their actions or lack of action, reflecting their duty to assess the foreseeable consequences of hazards.

The lesser-known career benefits of being a UCU rep –  academic leadership, citizenship, and collegiality

Here’s the final element that may persuade you to become a UCU caseworker and/or rep. You may think you’re not going to be very popular if you’re arguing with managers about workload, operation of complaints procedures, and so on. However, this really just needs a slight reconceptualization of what it is you’re doing.  A manager or HR may not immediately want to thank you for interfering, but you’re actually going beyond doing them a favour, you’re working for the greater good of the institution.

Good health and safety helps universities function better. Healthier, less stressed staff are more productive, and are more able to support students, or to put it another way, reducing stress and improving mental health improves the sustainability of the education system. The work you do to promote the health of your colleagues by arguing about work planners, or highlighting hazards such as bullying and problematic processes is explicitly recognised in everyone’s career paths, most obvious in your PDR and promotion forms. Let’s look at the alignment more closely.

Think firstly about your PDR form: “Contribution to the University Community”. What satisfies this more clearly, linked very obviously to the university values, than helping colleagues and managers improve the lives of their staff?

• ambition – I offer practical solutions to problems
• curiosity and discovery – I constructively challenge the status quo
• integrity and truth – I treat everyone with compassion
• an inclusive community – I support colleagues in difficulty

https://www.gla.ac.uk/myglasgow/staff/values/

Each college will likely have more than one strategic aim that health and safety work directly aligns with e.g. College of Arts 2026 includes the strategic aim of building and sustaining a caring and inclusive culture that supports wellbeing. https://www.gla.ac.uk/colleges/arts/aboutus/strategy/community/

Next, think about your promotion trajectory. Academic staff have a category “Leadership, Management and Engagement” – applicants should indicate how they have demonstrated excellence, e.g. through influencing learning and teaching practices, motivating colleagues, and co-ordinating activity that can be shown to have benefitted staff and students. One of my case studies for my senior RET was largely based on UCU work advancing the conditions of fellow teachers to help them maximise their effectiveness; however, the impact on students sometimes needs to be spelled out for those reading application forms (e.g. “Collegiality should be clearly and convincingly evidenced. .. and the impact of this collegiality should be evident by the combination of its depth … and breadth” https://www.gla.ac.uk/media/Media_1035592_smxx.pdf)

So, it’s often a question of spelling out the impacts of what you have done:

“Addressing health and safety should not be seen as a regulatory burden. It offers significant opportunities and benefits can include: …increased productivity, because employees are healthier, happier and better motivated https://www.hse.gov.uk/leadership/benefits.htm

Conclusion

Being a UCU Health and Safety Representative helps you see your institution through a lens that helps reveal concrete, practical ways to improve the lives of colleagues while satisfying your PDR and often elements towards your promotion ambitions. If you’ve ever found yourself unsatisfied by the reach or impact of some leadership and citizenship roles, or by your opportunities to improve negotiating skills, influence, and even policy analysis, sign up!

Even if you don’t sign up, do encourage colleagues to report health and safety concerns to UCU.

For more information contact ucug@glasgow.ac.uk

by Rhys Machold & Sayantan Ghosal

Download this blog post as a PDF here.

As you will have heard in recent communication from our Vice Chancellor Andy Schofield on 23 June, despite on one hand noting that despite delivering “a modest surplus in the current financial year”, our University’s overall “financial environment is becoming increasingly challenging.” He explained that in this environment, the University Court has now approved a budget that will seek to maintain “a small underlying financial surplus” in order to ensure “the long‑term sustainability of the institution.” As he went on, achieving this goal “will require significant further savings across all areas of expenditure and each of our budgetary units”, which will in turn “inevitably” result in “implications for the size of our workforce, affecting both academic and professional services roles.” In other words, welcome to a new period of financial austerity.

We are told this austerity being undertaken not by design but out of material necessity itself resulting from “inevitable” dynamics that are far beyond our University’s control. It also has no clear timeframe or specific targets beyond at least ostensibly ensuring our institution’s viability and by extension the long-term “wellbeing of our colleague and student community”, at least those of us who are not implicated in plans for future redundancies.

This announcement is perhaps on its face, not entirely surprising. After all, we have seen countless other universities announce and begin to enact similar austerity plans across Scotland and the UK in recent years. These have been justified by references to a range of distinct but also overlapping crises, whether falling international student numbers, poor investment decisions, rising costs, etc. etc. Yet, in our case in Glasgow, however, despite our VC’s claim about the impending austerity being “inevitable” consequence of conspiring external factors facing our institution’s viability, it is rather less than clear what these ostensible factors actually are.

Below is an overview of the actual figures we currently have access to, which paint a rather different picture about our current financial environment:

• Reserves: The University holds over £1.3 billion in unrestricted reserves, with £645.7 million in liquid funds — enough to run for more than 200 days without any income at all, well above the sector benchmark of 110–150 days. In addition, the university has a credit facility with banks of £200 million.
• Growing income: Total income has risen continuously for a decade including through the recent dip in international student numbers, with tuition fee income alone rising by nearly £70 million in 2024–25 and research income rising by £18.8 million. The University has recorded an annual operating surplus for over a decade.
• Low staff costs: The University’s staff costs as a proportion of income are among the lowest in the Russell Group — fourth lowest, above only Oxford, Cambridge, and Bristol.
• Cautious borrowing: Existing debt of around £250 million was secured at below 3% interest with repayment deferred until the 2030s at the earliest. Unlike three other major Scottish universities, Glasgow is no danger of breaking its loan covenants (it has £44.4 million cushion in meeting even the most stringent one).

Nevertheless, there are indeed some elements about our financial environment, unrelated to staffing costs, which are cause for concern:

• Capital Spend: Between now and 2040, annual capital spend is planned to be over £100 million+, double the historical average. A sinking fund to meet principal repayments beyond 2040 has been created. But there are no cuts planned in Glasgow’s anticipated capital spend.
• Rising consultancy fees: Between 2019-2026, the University spent over £114 million on consultancy fees (data from FOI request by UCU Goldsmith).

Based on our own rigorous analysis of these publicly-available figures, we have an alternative diagnosis of what our University is facing. Rather than facing an external set of pressures beyond our control that are forcing our leadership to act responsibly, the ailment we face is something altogether different. We call this austerity FOMO. For the uninitiated FOMO is the abbreviation for “fear of missing out”, broadly defined as a worried feeling that one may miss out on exciting events that others are partaking in.

Based on the clear disjuncture between our VC’s austerity vision and the data we have access to about our University’s actually-existing financial position, it is hard to come to any other conclusion. It seems to us that rather than taking an accurate assessment our current financial situation and being encouraged by our relative, some might even say exceptional, strength within our sector within Scotland and the UK, our leadership instead seems to be worried that they might well miss out on the austerity gripping the broader higher education sector at the moment.

This threat is very real. The University of Glasgow is already laying-off people on open-ended contracts: 52 Associate Tutors at the School of Education are to be made redundant at the start of the semester, 35 of whom are on open-ended contracts.

It is imperative to challenge and contest the SMG narrative that staff cuts are inevitable because of declining PGT numbers. An alternative would be to minimize the decline in PGT revenue (and not just numbers) and focus on generating additional sources of revenue (commercial activities, industry collaboration, increased research income, new modules and teaching initiatives) by working with (and not against) faculty or adopting an ad hoc slash and burn approach to cutting costs devoid of any strategic thinking and consideration.

That the SMG are focusing on staff cuts is a management and political choice (i.e. Austerity FOMO). Other approaches can and should be explored in consultation with the staff and relevant unions.

Of course, exploiting political crises is nothing new. Nearly two decades ago Naomi Klein alerted us to this dynamic in her powerful book The Shock Doctrine, which traced the origins of what she called the rise of “disaster capitalism”. While fear is, no doubt, at work in austerity FOMO is clearly borne out of a fear on missing out the potential transformative force of disaster capitalism that Klein chronicles. Austerity FOMO is thus different from the general shock doctrine in at least one respect : it is not merely an attempt to exploit an external disaster that has already happened; rather it is an attempt to fabricate a crisis which does not yet exist, at least not in the form it is being presented.

It is for this reason that UCU Glasgow is calling on our membership to find ways to raise awareness about how austerity FOMO is being mobilized as the basis of a major assault on all of us as a choice rather than economic necessity. Only by drawing attention to the fictitious basis of this new wave of austerity that can we begin to develop a strong response to it. So we encourage you to get the word out! Speak to your colleagues and let it be known: we are being deceived into a crisis which is entirely made up and entirely avoidable! Facts matter and in this instance they are clearly on our side!

Mariel Goulart, Marion Hersh and Sarah Currier (all Glasgow) UCU Delegates

Introduction and conference atmosphere

The 15th Annual STUC LGBT+ Workers’ Conference took place on Saturday 16th and Sunday 17th May 2026 at the Golden Jubilee Conference Hotel in Clydebank, Glasgow. The atmosphere was great – welcoming, energetic and genuinely supportive.

A standout moment was the panel session on Sunday morning featuring one of Scotland’s first trans MSPs. The panel included Oceana Maud (Equality Network / Scottish Trans), Zarith (Care 4 Calais) and Tammy Hymas (Policy Lead, TransActual). Hearing them speak about trans rights, asylum solidarity and grassroots organising was inspiring and a powerful reminder of why LGBT+ visibility in politics and trade unions matters. We also appreciated the workshops on ACE / ARO awareness and A People’s History of LGBT+ Liberation. A motion on Decriminalising sex work was remitted and all the other motions were carried.

Motions UCU was directly involved in

Our two motions on Trans Rights – Countering the Threats and Organising Against Reform and the Far Right in many ways encapsulated the two main themes of the conferences and both were composited (combined) with other motions.  The Advancing Trans and Non-Binary Rights Composite  reaffirms full support for trans and non‑binary workers. It notes that the Supreme Court ruling on “sex” has not changed legal protection for gender reassignment. It warns that employers might force trans workers to use disabled toilets instead of facilities matching their lived gender. The motion calls on the STUC LGBT+ Workers’ Committee to produce guidance on trans rights for members and to encourage affiliates to join demonstrations and events supporting trans rights.  Sarah spoke about our experiences organising locally in support of trans members.

The Tackling the Far Right composite condemns the rise of Reform UK and far right groups who weaponise anti‑trans and anti‑LGBT+ hate. It states that transphobia is part of the same harmful far right narratives attacking all minorities. The motion calls on the STUC LGBT+ Workers’ Committee to develop training for union reps and create resources on the far right origins of anti‑trans hate.  Marion spoke about the even greater threat from Reform getting into political power than their detestable violent attacks and the need to be active in countering them.

We also seconded a motion on Pride and Prejudice from the FBU which we had amended.  Marion spoke on the importance of Pride remaining political and non-commercialised.  Mariel spoke very movingly about the situation in Brazil to a motion from Usdaw on International Solidarity.

Next steps

UCU has a vital role in defending LGBTQ+ members against discrimination, harassment and far right hostility. Through collective bargaining, legal advice, rep training and active campaigning, we need to make sure that trans, non‑binary and all LGBTQ+ members are safe and supported at work. This conference showed again that a strong union presence, including UCU’s voice, is essential to turning policy into real protection for our members.  Our rights have advanced, but there continue to be threats which we need to overcome.  The current threats are the Supreme Court Judgement and EHRC guidelines and we need to be active in challenging them and ensuring our workplaces remain welcoming and provide appropriate facilities to trans, non-binary, intersex and gender non-conforming members.

Like many other delegations we took a photo with the Transpride banner (above) and hope to invite them to a branch meeting.  We would encourage other LGBTQ+ members to attend the conference next year.

If you are a UCU Glasgow member & you want to join the LGBT+ Subcommittee and/or the EHRC Working Group please email: ucug@glasgow.ac.uk

UCUG Finance working group blog #1 May 2026

Safe but too safe: excessive prudence as a form of institutional self-harm?

The first in a planned series of blogs about university finances at Glasgow

We all know that Higher Education in Scotland and in the UK as a whole is in crisis, but this crisis is not evenly spread across the sector. The University of Glasgow’s Senior Management assure us that Glasgow’s finances are not under threat…yet, but we are seeing budgets verging on austerity. We are working in an environment of ever-increasing workload, not least because an effective recruitment freeze means departing colleagues are never replaced. Management renege on promised pay spine restructuring using the sector’s difficulties to justify successive below-inflation pay rises. Meanwhile, PhD studentships and personal research allowances are slashed and buildings and services are allowed to crumble around us taking their toll on morale and productivity. Fixed term contracts are not renewed, a “hidden” redundancy?  GTA budgets have been slashed. What impact will these cuts have on Glasgow’s ability to raise research funding? How will individual subject areas and the University maintain their global rankings?

UCUG set out to understand the University finances, with expert advice, to discover whether you should be worried – you may be surprised by what we learned.

University finances as for any large organisation are complex and opaque to those who are unfamiliar with them. There are many accounting games that can be played and some staggeringly large numbers involved when the value of the physical assets (buildings & land) and endowments (money given for some specific purpose) are considered. However, the current financial health of the University is dependent on the balance between its income (largely from teaching, grants for research and from government) set against its expenditure (staff salaries, infrastructure maintenance, new buildings & interest on borrowing). Over time an institution can build up reserves when income exceeds expenditure (called a surplus) or eat into its reserves when in deficit. The “available funds” are a university’s equivalent of cash in the bank – money that they can use to cover unexpected dips in income. A yearly surplus and a comfortable reserve are indicators of sound financial health, but excessive surpluses and reserves mean that the income is not being put to good use by hiring enough staff to teach the students and carry out the research that are the University’s missions.

Glasgow riding high in stormy waters?

The situation at Dundee, as well as recent press coverage of Edinburgh and Strathclyde, feeds a narrative that the HE crisis is existential for Scotland’s universities old and new. However, the University of Glasgow is in a very strong financial position with turnover of over a billion pounds last year, has increased annual income continuously for the last 10 years (including the last two when international student numbers declined), and reported £1.3 billion in unrestricted reserves in 2024-25.

Glasgow’s annual report 2024/25, p. 30 notes that: “Available funds (cash and cash equivalents and investments) increased by £7.5m to £645.7m (2023-24 £638.2m).” These are liquid “reserves” that can be utilised to meet demand for payments. Since the university also has access to revolving credit facilities providing up to a further £200m, it is well-positioned against shocks. If the University’s income dried up overnight, these funds would allow it to run for over 200 days (“liquidity days”) before dipping into its overdraft. At present, most universities aim to have 110-150 of “days” of liquidity and only when this falls below 60 is it likely to cause issues.

This scale of reserves, credit and endowment mean the university could withstand severe income losses over multiple years before it came anywhere close to Dundee’s situation.

Glasgow’s income from overseas students increased markedly in 2024/25, when others saw severe downturns. An additional 1500 international students registered last year driving the overall increase in income recorded for 2024-25: tuition fees increased by £69.8 million as part of a total increase income of £93.2 million with increased in research income (£19.2 million) being the other significant component.

Although the annual report suggests that 2024-25 PGT numbers were lower, it also notes that income met or exceeded budget forecasts. Both PGT numbers and income are in a volatile state and downward trend, but the degree of this decline matters. An overly negative assessment of the downside (as happened for the last two years in a row) leads to aggressive cuts and damaging savings targets.

Staff costs as a proportion of income show UoG is several %age points below the sector average (HESA DT031 Table 1, Academic years 2015/16 to 2024/25). This ratio was the fourth lowest of all Russell Group universities above only Cambridge, Oxford and Bristol (and noting that the first two of these have such high income their staff cost ratios are consistently low compared to other RGs).

Prudent borrowing at low interest rates is another feature of Glasgow’s current financial position. In the past the University borrowed roughly £250m at interest rates below 3% with capital repayment deferred until the end of the next decade at the earliest (2024-25 financial statement). This is the kind of mortgage deal that you would kill for.

The dangers of excessive prudence: Money in the bank is money not working for the institution

Large chunks of the University’s income depend on its reputation.

• The Research Excellence Grant from SFC (£53.6m in 2025-26 https://www.sfc.ac.uk/publications/university-final-funding-allocations-2025-26/) depends on performance in REF combined with research power, which quantifies the number of staff and PhD students engaged in research.
• Overseas fee income depends on particular metrics of the University’s reputation such as the QS World University Rankings. Being in the top 50 or top 100 has a dramatic impact on how keen overseas Governments and Scholarship funders are to send students to Glasgow.

The University is also a registered charity and whether it can justify its reserves level with its charitable purpose is a theme we expect to cover in a later blog.

Spending too little on staff and their environment hurts morale & productivity as well as delivering a less good student experience. We wouldn’t argue for more shiny new buildings but research & teaching staff time spent dealing with water (and worse) damage from leaking drains & roofs, with collapsing ceilings, and shivering in winter and boiling in summer due to failed heating or air conditioning is not time spent writing 4 star outputs or delivering an excellent student experience.

QS rankings depend on the opinions of others who know us. Will PGT numbers and income be negatively affected by current austerity measures? How will cuts to personal research allowances and recruitment freezes impact on the University’s ability to increase research income? Do your invited seminar speakers remember their visit to the University with envy or because they had to trek from building to building to meet colleagues in the same School before walking across campus in the rain to a randomly allocated lecture room with half functioning projectors and a disgusting toilet next door?

Questions you should ask in staff meetings

What specific savings target is my College/School/Service being asked to make this year and next year?

Are you as Head of School/College/Service satisfied with the assumptions underlying the need to make this level of savings?