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National bargaining is not only about pay but also about terms and conditions of employment. The national contract is fundamental to the health, safety and wellbeing of academic staff in post-92 universities and needs to be applied in pre-92 universities. This contract is underpinned by the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service report on teaching staff contracts, which defines teaching load boundaries, research and scholarly activity entitlements, balancing of a range of academic duties and intellectual property and external work rights.

So some vice-chancellors consider improved pay can be delivered only by greater productivity. Perhaps they could consider how they might achieve this by appropriate use of management, academic, professional, technical and administrative roles, better management practices, less waste of resources supporting top-heavy and expensive management structures and less bureaucracy in staff workloads.

Sandra Jeans
Branch chair, University and College Union, Gloucestershire University