Sunderland University attacks pensions with 2-tier workforce – UCU

The University of Sunderland is set to deny newly appointed academic tutors access to the industry standard Teachers’ Pension Scheme (TPS) from tomorrow (Saturday 1 August), announced the University and College Union (UCU).

New tutors will be employed through a sham company, wholly owned by the university, so it can avoid having them on its books. All directly employed academics can access TPS meaning the changes will create a two-tier workforce.

Management claims it is attacking pension benefits because it needs to make savings, but admits it is likely to only save a maximum of £36k during the next academic year.

The changes are being brought in just weeks after the Government confirmed employer TPS contribution rates will fall by more than a third. UCU estimates this will save Sunderland over £3m each year from April 2027.

In May Parliament’s Education Committee recommended “the Government could prohibit the creation of wholly owned subsidiaries which are being used to avoid the requirement for TPS membership.”

UCU general secretary Jo Grady said:

University of Sunderland management’s shameful decision to use a sham company to deny workers access to TPS is a moral stain on higher education. It means the institution will be a pariah in the Northeast and across the sector. Sunderland has a legal obligation to provide TPS, and Parliament has urged the Government step in and stop rogue university employers from flouting their duties.

Academic tutors are among the university’s lowest earners and are the most likely to have regular concerns about their job security. This change will do nothing to alter that and will instead create a two-tier workforce and exacerbate low morale.

Now the cost of TPS has fallen so dramatically, this pension attack seems designed to cause uproar among the staff body. Our members have voted to defend the scheme for both current and future staff, and it is scandalous the university executive has ignored their voices.

Students arriving in the new academic year won’t be happy to find out they’ll be taught by staff on worse terms and conditions, and by an organisation that is not the University of Sunderland. The university needs to stop riding roughshod over its legal obligations, do the right thing and reverse this decision.