In Scotland’s college sector, industrial disputes have simply become par for the course - over the past decade, there has only been one year in which college bosses and their staff were not in direct conflict.

When national bargaining for the sector was introduced, the hope was that a single national negotiation – after all staff had been brought up to the same salary levels – would smooth the process of agreeing fair, and funded, pay awards. The reality has been quite different, and colleges have now been in some sort of dispute for most of the last decade.

When this crisis does receive attention, the spotlight generally falls on the campaigns of EIS-FELA, the trade union representing Scotland’s college lecturers. Its members have gone out on strike, disrupting classes and forming picket lines, numerous time over the years in an effort to secure appropriate pay rises and protect conditions – but throughout that period, support staff have also found themselves embroiled in what has felt like a near-constant cycle of employment disputes.

You could be forgiven for assuming that lecturers make up the vast majority of college staff, but in reality the split between teaching and non-teaching employees is almost 50-50 – and as anybody in education (or at least anybody with any sense) will tell you, the support staff are absolutely vital to everything else that happens.

READ MORE

'Chronic underfunding' – Colleges face budget gap of nearly half a billion pounds

Deep Dive: Exploring the key stats for Scotland's college sector

There are 52 billion reasons why Scotland's colleges matter

Despite that, they are very often undervalued – both in terms of work they do, and the rewards they should receive for doing it.

Speak to people who do these jobs – which vary from classroom support to IT services to building management and much more – and you hear complaints of low pay, poor career progression routes, rising workloads, and ongoing cuts to the very services they provide.

One told me that staff morale is “at an all-time low”.

“I have never seen it so bad, with all of the existing issues plus the current mess of the pay deal and being forgotten about by government. There’s also a real nasty ‘us and them’ feeling between management and staff that has been getting worse over the last few years.”

Mental health levels, they added, are poor and getting worse.

Although lecturing and support staff disputes have been sparked by similar catalysts over the years, there is one issue that is unique to the non-teaching side of the college workforce: a job evaluation programme that “was meant to take six months and is now still dragging on after six years.”

The result of all of this is that support staff are currently in dispute with college employers. Like lecturers, they have not received a pay rise to help them cope with the cost of living crisis. An offer has been tabled, and accepted by both Unite and the GMB – but UNISON represents far more staff than both of those unions and, as of yet, has refused to accept the deal.

Janet Stewart, the Further Education Lead Officer for UNISON Scotland points out that union represents more than 2500 support staff, and that the work they do disproportionately benefits the most vulnerable students:

“It is often the poorer more disadvantaged students who benefit most from the work our members in further education do. They are less likely to have a computer so need the IT department and library support to help them. Single parents need guidance to help them sort out childcare or finances to be able to study. Disadvantaged youngsters often need welfare support to keep their studying on track. And how does any course run without administrators to organise them?”

And yet, as well as the pay dispute, support staff face direct job cuts across the sector.

“In Perth College we have just been notified that 70 jobs – which includes 34 support staff – are about to go,” Stewart says. “It appears as if this will include the closure – and resulting staff loss – of the campus nursery doubtless causing real difficulty for students who use that childcare facility. There are similar job cuts threatened in Moray and Glasgow City colleges. Colleges say they need to close millions of pounds funding gaps.”

READ MORE

There are 52 billion reasons why Scotland's colleges matter

'I left school with nothing but college has changed my life'

Insight: The gender divides in Scotland's colleges

UNISON members for voted for strike action at the end of 2023. There have been a few strike days so far, and the mandate for doing so runs until the end of May – but it had been hoped that a deal could be struck and further disruption avoided. Although talks are ongoing, and rumours of an impending agreement had been quietly spreading, there seems to be a good chance of more strike action from members going forward:

“Further education is vital to fighting poverty, delivering public services, and producing a skilled workforce," Stewart says. "And it is under severe strain. Industrial relations are poor, we are in the longest dispute since devolution and these vital services are simply disappearing and this Scottish government seems to be just standing aside and letting it happen.”