{"id":570,"date":"2021-06-25T15:19:51","date_gmt":"2021-06-25T14:19:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/ucuuok\/?p=570"},"modified":"2021-06-25T15:19:51","modified_gmt":"2021-06-25T14:19:51","slug":"uss-update-hq-and-uuk-surveys-on-uss-proposal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/ucuuok\/2021\/06\/25\/uss-update-hq-and-uuk-surveys-on-uss-proposal\/","title":{"rendered":"USS Update: HQ and UUK Surveys on USS Proposal"},"content":{"rendered":"<h1>Short Summary (TL; DR)<\/h1>\n<ul>\n<li>Please oppose Option A in the upcoming survey on the USS that management is about to send out. It involves huge cuts to pensions based on an unjustified and debunked valuation.<\/li>\n<li>Please<a href=\"https:\/\/forms.gle\/95gtMTTg7j45Bq8L8\">\u00a0complete the HQ survey<\/a>\u00a0(previously circulated by email) to indicate when would be the best time to take action as a national union to defend pensions &amp; pay.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h1>Full Update<\/h1>\n<p>Following a series of back and forth communications, the USS Trustees released a new proposal for UUK\u2019s consideration, who are <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ussemployers.org.uk\/news\/uuk-launches-short-consultation-uss-employers\">now consulting member Universities<\/a> between 18 June &#8211; 5 July. Following a sub-JSNCC meeting earlier this week, EG will themselves consult members of staff on the proposal, \u2018Option A\u2019.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ucu.org.uk\/article\/11618\/UUK-consultation-is-PR-exercise-to-justify-slashing-pensions-says-UCU\">In line with the national UCU position<\/a>, I am writing to recommend that you strongly oppose Option A, which would be to accept devastating cuts to staff pensions. In specific, Option A amounts to a cap on indexation of 2.5%, a reduction from 60k to 40k in the Direct Benefit hybrid, and a cut in accrual from 1\/75 to 1\/85. In general, UUK says we should pay more, work longer, have fewer guarantees, for a worse pension that will not track inflation.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.ussemployers.org.uk\/news\/employers-request-review-2020-valuation-approach\">UUK was highly critical of the 2020 valuation<\/a> and requested a review, which USS rejected on 29 March. UUK then conducted an in-depth consultation between 7 April &#8211; 24 May, that asked questions about covenant support, USS governance and proposed changes to the scheme.<\/p>\n<p>Reporting on this consultation UUK has so far <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ussemployers.org.uk\/news\/uss-employers-back-changes-pension-scheme\">issued only a short statement<\/a>, 15 June, promising further detail this month. Yet, this statement repeated the incorrect claim that:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>UUK\u2019s proposal would lead to a headline reduction of about 12% in future pension benefits.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>UUK know this statement is incorrect as UUK\u2019s own <a href=\"https:\/\/mikeotsuka.medium.com\/why-does-uuk-continue-to-make-false-or-misleading-claims-about-life-expectancy-f7672641ced8\">actuary confirmed the average cut is 21%<\/a>, while <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ucu.org.uk\/ussmodeller\">UCU\u2019s individual modeller<\/a>, designed by their actuary, demonstrates the high level of individual cuts, with the largest falling disproportionately on younger members of staff and so also disproportionately impacting those from under-represented groups.<\/p>\n<p>UCU has rightly referred to UUK\u2019s behaviour as a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ucu.org.uk\/article\/11618\/UUK-consultation-is-PR-exercise-to-justify-slashing-pensions-says-UCU\">PR exercise to justify slashing pensions<\/a>. UUK has now opened this second consultation, with a two week deadline, that contains almost no mention of the level of cuts or detail on proposals for flexible options.<\/p>\n<p>For these reasons, and given that all stakeholders consider the valuation unjustified, I recommend you firmly reject Option A, which would slash staff pensions. I also recommend you call on UUK in the survey to join with UCU on the JNC to propose sustainable reforms to the governance of USS, to publicly lobby for a better understanding of the strength of the sector and to defend staff pensions against this unjustified attack.<\/p>\n<h1>What you can do<\/h1>\n<ul>\n<li>Oppose Option A in the upcoming survey that management are about to release. This will demonstrate the strength of members\u2019 will and encourage them to adopt an opposing position.<\/li>\n<li>Please\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/forms.gle\/95gtMTTg7j45Bq8L8\">complete the HQ survey<\/a>\u00a0(previously circulated by email) to indicate when would be the best time to take action as a national union to defend pensions &amp; pay.<\/li>\n<li>Fill in\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.ucu.org.uk\/ussmodeller\">the USS modeller<\/a>\u00a0to see how the current proposals will impact your pensions.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Short Summary (TL; DR) Please oppose Option A in the upcoming survey on the USS that management is about to send out. It involves huge &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/ucuuok\/2021\/06\/25\/uss-update-hq-and-uuk-surveys-on-uss-proposal\/\">Read&nbsp;more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39717,"featured_media":569,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[155772,177089,155770],"tags":[229873,782,155770],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/ucuuok\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/570"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/ucuuok\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/ucuuok\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/ucuuok\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/39717"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/ucuuok\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=570"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/ucuuok\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/570\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":571,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/ucuuok\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/570\/revisions\/571"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/ucuuok\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/569"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/ucuuok\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=570"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/ucuuok\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=570"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/ucuuok\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=570"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}