Please remember to vote in the Higher Education pay and equality e-ballot (closes noon Wed 27 June)

You should have received several emails, most recently this morning, from UCU's Head of HE Paul Bridge, entitled "Reminder: UCU pay and equality consultation".

If you have not received an email with a link for you to vote, please request one at once using this link.

The deadline is noon Wednesday 27 June 2018.

Some key points:

• The employers have offered just 2%. With the current rate of inflation, this amounts to a ~1.5% pay cut. When you take into account the fact that USS are threatening to impose a cost of 3.7% of salary on top, a 2% "increase" amounts to a 5% pay cut in real terms.
• We fought a successful fight to defend our pension. Although the final outcome is unknown, we successfully resisted the introduction of a Defined Contribution scheme.
• However, if the current USS Joint Expert Panel determines that we have to pay more for our Defined Benefit scheme, we'll need higher salaries to compensate. The effect of additional USS contributions from April 2019 could amount to a total pay reduction of 5%.
• The forerunner of UCU, the AUT, fought to institute better pay scales across HE a decade ago. The result was designed to make the greatest improvements for those on lower pay points. Part-time workers benefited, but have struggled since to make ends meet, whilst making an important contribution to the university. The real-terms pay erosion has been especially hard on part-time and/or lower-paid workers.
• Of huge importance in our pay claim is a nationally agreed framework for action to close the gender pay gap by 2020, to end precarious contracts, and recognise excessive workloads. The employers offer further working groups, but little to immediately address the gender pay gap, and they refuse to act on excessive workloads or compensate members for hours actually worked.
• The money is there. The employers have posted accounts showing record surpluses - between £1.5bn and £2.3bn - over the last three years.

Please do take the opportunity to vote in this important e-ballot.

Your Executive Committee recommends that you vote to reject the offer and vote 'yes' for industrial action.