The Scottish Socialist Party has sent its solidarity to EIS union members who have been on strike over the threat of compulsory redundancies at the University of the West of Scotland.
Trade Union organisers have made clear that job losses will have a devastating impact not just on workers, but also on learners and the many different communities served by university campuses.
SSP National Trade Union Organiser Richie Venton spoke with EIS-ULA Branch Secretary Katie Clark at the picket line:
Richie Venton added:
“Members of the EIS union were out on strike again today at the University of the West of Scotland – to resist the brutal threat of compulsory redundancies, which would devastate staff and wreck much of the education on offer to working-class students, for which UWS has won accolades.
“The Scottish government should stop acting like a latter-day Pontius Pilate, washing their hands of the destruction of Higher Education, with feeble excuses that universities are independent institutions; they’re funded with public money!
“Instead, the government should step in with proper funding, but also tackle the grotesque mismanagement by overpaid principals more intent on gaining a reputation for slashing budgets and building vanity projects than for advancing public education.
“We need full public funding of education, through taxation of millionaires and big business, with democratic management of universities – elected boards of management on skilled wages, not the £280,000 salary plus £40,000 expenses grabbed by the UWS principal who is busy wielding the axe, trying to bully staff into “voluntary” severance by threatening that compulsory redundancies will only result in the legal minimum redundancy packages.”
