The most common form of these contracts is an “hourly paid teaching contract” – whereby lecturers are paid an hourly rate for teaching duties. Almost 70 per cent of those insecurely employed are these contracts.
A report published on Friday (June 9) warns of an emerging “shadow further education sector” whereby colleges are using wholly owned subsidiary companies to hire teachers on inferior terms and conditions.
The UCU says these companies employ staff on “casualised worker contracts” which deny them the same rights as permanent staff. These rights include protection from unfair dismissal, the right to redundancy pay and maternity leave, and being part of the pension scheme.
It says that 19 colleges have more than 50 per cent of their staff on precarious contracts.
The report is based on responses to a Freedom of Information request sent to every further education college in England and Wales. A total of 201 colleges returned data and within these institutions 17,171 staff are on insecure contracts – 28 per cent.
These contracts are “heavily concentrated” at the lower levels of the career path. UCU general secretary, Sally Hunt, said: “Research has shown that poor working conditions for staff mean poor learning conditions for students. The easy hire and fire culture that comes with precarious contracts and farming out teaching to subsidiary companies is a false economy that weakens educational institutions.
“We believe that these companies are being set up in a blatant attempt to avoid proper pay and conditions for staff, and to undermine the work of trade unions. It is a shameful practice which leaves staff worse off.
“UCU is calling on the further education employers to work in partnership with the union to tackle precarious work and build viable teaching careers that can underpin high-quality further education.”
The UCU report complains of a lack of engagement from colleges on the issue after the union wrote to 220 institutions seeking a commitment to negotiate improvements.
The report states: “The response showed a sector effectively in denial: 120 college leaderships simply ignored the letter. Many responded negatively. Only around 30 college leaderships offered any kind of positive response. Some of these are now in negotiations with UCU but the vast majority of colleges have taken no action.”