Defend the UCL Palestine solidarity camp!

 

Palestinian solidarity activists turned out in force in Camden on Saturday following reports that Zionists were threatening to attack the Gaza solidarity camp at University College London (UCL). But on the day the Zionists were heavily outnumbered and the two sides were kept well apart by the police.

On the street;...

by New Worker correspondent

Outsourcing was one of the issues exercising the security guards employed by Bidvest Noonan belonging to the small street union, the Independent Workers Union of Great Britain (IWGB) at University College London (UCL) who joined in the massive day of strike action on Wednesday 1 February.
    In addition to a demand for a £15.00 hourly rate (which is the equivalent to that paid in 2002), they are seeking an end to outsourcing, and union recognition. In October UCL attempted to break a IWGB strike by employing subcontracting workers on a lower rate of pay in an attempt to break the last IWGB strike, despite running a £90 million yearly surplus.
This was condemned by University and College Union and the IWGB as an intimidatory strike breaking tactic and as a violation of UCL’s theoretical commitment to parity on account of these workers receiving lower rates of pay.
    The IWGB states that commitment to parity of terms and conditions with directly employed staff was won following IWGB strike action in 2019, while this resulted in improved pay, pension contributions and sick pay and annual leave entitlements full equality has not been achieved.
    Matteo Tiratelli, UCU’s Anti-Casualisation Officer at UCL added: “Outsourcing creates terrible working conditions for workers on the lowest grades at UCL, yet UCL management is determined to keep up this discriminatory practice. It is one of several ways in which working conditions are being worsened across the board. All staff at UCL are seeing our pay fall behind inflation, our jobs casualised and rights stripped away, and it is sadly not just staff, but students who are paying the price.”
    Yusuf Nur, a striking security guard, says: “I have young children and on the poverty pay I receive as an outsourced worker I am struggling to support them. I’ve been left with no choice but to strike - it’s the only way we can make our voices heard. After bullying, mistreatment and consistent basic errors with paying us our wages and pensions from Bidvest Noonan and neglect from UCL, we must fight for better conditions for each other and our families.”
The same union also claims victory in one of the north London borough of Barnet, which for two decades was held up as model of economical outsourcing by the Tory controlled council, who outsourced just about anything that was not nailed down.
    Now under Labour control, 330 affected workers presently employed by outsourcing multinational Capita, (or Crapita to Private Eye readers) will be brought back in-house from 1 April.
    2012 saw the Tory council hand over much of its services to Capita on decade-long contracts. Capita lived up to its nickname, with a decade of controversies including a multi-million-pound fraud and contracts running vastly over budget.
    After the May elections Labour won control of the council, and although the contracts had already been due to end next year, the council has fast-tracked plans to bring some services back in house.
    John Burgess, the union’s Barnet local government branch secretary declared: “This is good news for staff, good news for residents and good news for the services. I welcome the decision and look forward to welcoming back all the services back into Barnet Council where they all belong”.
    He pointed out that after a decade of campaigning, and a start to bringing services in-house: “there are still many issues to address for our members who are being TUPE’d”.
    “These include workplace inequalities such as staff being paid differently for the same role. Barnet UNISON is already seeking discussions with the council about harmonisation of the terms and conditions of the TUPE’d workforce”.
    Another strike involving outsourced workers is taking place in the north-west London borough of Hounslow whose most lovable of workers, Parking Enforcement Officers, started a strike which could last until 5 March.
    Employed by giant outsourcer Serco who last declared profits of £309.9 million, they are fighting for decent pay.
    Neighbouring boroughs Ealing and Brent councils recently conceded a pay rise after strike action. Civil enforcement officers and CCTV operators in Ealing received a 9 per cent rise pay increase back dated to April 2022 with low paid new starters getting 11.94 per cent, with another eight per cent from next April, and extra annual leave entitlement. In comparison, in Brent, workers are getting a total increase of pay rise of 10.7 per cent from last April with nine per cent to come in April.
    Unite’s general secretary, Sharon Graham said: “Serco and Hounslow council’s refusal to address the scourge of low pay is shameful. The truth is that the London Living Wage is not enough to live on. Serco is hugely wealthy. The Council and its outsourcer have the ability to pay workers more.
    “The strike will inevitably mean that parking restrictions across the borough will fall apart. Bosses need to realise the workers have Unite’s total support.”

UCL removes names of eugenicists from facilities

Following the recent wave of Black Lives Matter protests a number of institutions and organisations are re-examining their ethos’ to make them more inclusive. University College London has taken a stand to address its historical links with the controversial eugenics movement following an inquiry made earlier this year.

University College London (UCL) has now removed the names of two prominent eugenics from two lecture theatres and a building.

The University’s Galton Lecture Theatre had been named after Francis Galton, the man who first coined the term ‘eugenics’ in 1883. Galton was a cousin of Charles Darwin and believed that in order to ‘raise the present miserably low standard of the human race’ we needed to ‘breed the best with the best’.

The Pearson Lecture Theatre and the Pearson Building had both been named after Karl Pearson, the UK’s first professional chair of eugenics.

The Galton Lecture Theatre has been renamed Lecture Theatre 115; the Pearson Lecture Theatre has been changed to Lecture Theatre G22 and the Pearson Building will now be known as the North-West Wing.

The University said last week they would remove the signs on the building and lecture theatres with immediate effect and that other changes to names and maps of signposts would be made as soon as possible.

UCL’s president and provost, Prof Michael Arthur, who made the decision to rename the facilities following a series of recommendations earlier in the year told the Guardian it was “an important first step for the university.”

Eugenics was the study of selective breeding that aimed to improve the genetic quality of the human population by excluding groups deemed inferior and promoting those seen as superior.

    “This problematic history has, and continues, to cause significant concern for many in our community and has a profound impact on the sense of belonging that we want all of our staff and students to have,” Prof Arthur said.

    “Although UCL is a very different place than it was in the 19th century, any suggestion that we celebrate these ideas or the figures behind them creates an unwelcoming environment for many in our community”.

He added that this decision is “just one step in a journey” and that there is much more work to be done to address racism and inequality in the UCL community.

Ijeoma Uchegbu, a professor of pharmaceutical nanoscience and the provost’s envoy for race equality, said: “I cannot begin to express my joy at this decision. Our buildings and spaces are places of learning and aspiration and should never have been named after eugenicists”.

Sputnik

NCP at UCL

Andy Brooks at UCL

by New Worker correspondent

New Communist Party (NCP) leader Andy Brooks successfully led the opposition to an anti-communist motion at a students’ union discussion at the Bloomsbury Campus of University College London (UCL) this week.

The UCL Debating Society is the oldest society at UCL and the third oldest debating society in England. The event was part of their Monday Night Public Debate Programme, which aims to raise awareness of key current issues and challenge people’s opinions.

The organisers said that given that many commentators are predicting the end of neoliberalism and the rise of socialism’s popularity in Britain, there was now a need to explore why so many right-wing thinkers are try to create a moral equivalence between fascism and communism and demonise the ideology’s symbol. They said that further discussion on this topic is required and that a large part of the responsibility for doing so lies in universities and student societies, such as the UCL Debating Society, that reach the entire student body.

The motion that "This House believes that the Hammer and Sickle should be considered a hate symbol” was moved by representatives of the reactionary Henry Jackson Society and the Institute of Economic Affairs, another right-wing think-tank.

The movers repeated the usual Cold War litany about Stalin’s “crimes”, Pol Pot, gulags and “repression” – but their arguments were easily demolished by Andy Brooks, whose case was ably supported by another London student.

The NCP leader said that the banning of communist symbols was the precursor for banning communist parties that wasn’t even done in the imperialist heartlands during the height of the Cold War. It was being done now by the Ukrainian fascist regime and the other reactionary governments in eastern Europe because they fear the resurgence of the working-class movement and seek to suppress it by using back-door methods to circumvent European law that forbids the banning of political parties or the establishment of one-party states. Though these regimes equate communism with fascism they don’t really believe this – if they did they wouldn’t elevate their past fascist leaders, such as the Ukrainian collaborators idolised by the Kiev regime, or the pre-war clerical-fascist leaders of Poland and Hungary who have now been incorporated into their official historical narrative.

A lively debate followed the openings, but the opposition had clearly won the day and it ended with the defeat of the reactionary motion at the vote.

The UCL Debating Society was first established in 1828 to encourage debate, freedom of speech and critical thought amongst the student community. It holds regular meetings throughout the academic year that are open to anyone who wishes to attend.