UCOL strike will go ahead

Last minute negotiations between UCOL staff and their employer failed to resolve the long-running pay dispute between the two.

UCOL staff who are union members will strike tomorrow for a pay rise after months of negotiations and other industrial action has not resolved the negotiating stalemate. UCOL staff want a pay rise. The employer offered to discuss a pay increase later in the year but only on the basis that UCOL receives new government funding, not already budgeted for.

The strike will take place between 1pm and 3pm at each of the polytechnic’s three campuses in Whanganui, Palmerston North and Masterton.

The Tertiary Education Union’s local branch president Tina Smith says since 2010 UCOL has given pay rises that add up to 5.6 percent. But over the same time, inflation rose 8.3 percent.

Tina Smith says UCOL staff are good people teaching job skills and thus creating good job opportunities in their local regions, but they are getting poorer.

“We deserve fair pay.”

“Government funding cuts are making life very tough for local polytechnics like UCOL. But UCOL can still make a choice – does it value its good local people who work hard every day to give students the skills they need to find work, or not?”

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