Statement on USS pension talks

The Joint Negotiating Committee (JNC) held yesterday (Thursday) noted that both Universities UK and the University and College Union (UCU) had submitted negotiating position papers, but did not regard the current iteration as their final positions. Accordingly, no proposals were submitted to vote at the meeting.
 
The parties have agreed to a series of negotiating meetings between now and the next scheduled JNC to be held on Thursday 15 January 2015. The purpose of these meetings is to close the differences between the stakeholders' negotiating positions, with a view to reaching agreement. This will include a meeting between the respective actuaries of the USS Trustee Board, UUK, and UCU.
 
With the aim of encouraging productive discussions, UUK and UCU agree to consult their constituent structures* on the prospect of suspending the current industrial action from 20 November 2014 until after the JNC scheduled for 15 January 2015. The consultation will be concluded by 19 November.
 
The intention of the consultation is to consider whether the parties are able to reach agreement that a suspension of industrial action at this early stage will mean that no member of staff will have had pay deducted and students will not have been adversely affected.
 
This is on the basis that, at this point, institutions will not have found it necessary to apply their policies to withhold pay for the assessment and marking boycott and that individual members of staff who were participating in the industrial action will have been able to remedy, within a reasonable time scale, any backlog of work that actually resulted from the industrial action between 6 to 20 November.

* UCU's higher education committee will meet on Wednesday (19 November).