Statement on the cancellation

Please be aware about the following changes to immigration documentation requirements. The UK government is replacing physical documents with an online system for immigration status, also known as an eVisa. You will no longer be able to use your physical documents to return to the UK or prove your immigration status within the UK from 1 January 2025 onwards.

More information here

There is a members’ meeting Wed 9 Oct, 12:30pm on Zoom.

Zoom Code: https://zoom.us/s/96877191504 PW: 0161

Agenda:

1. Input to 2035 strategy.
   • Encourage member involvement and discuss a TU strategy for UoM. 
   • Link to strategy website: https://www.manchester.ac.uk/about/manchester-2035/ 
2. Introduction to the new Exec
   • https://manchester.web.ucu.org.uk/about/executive-committee/ 
3. Casework update 
4. Lunchbreak campaign – Push to ensure colleagues are taking a lunch break 
5. Any Motions
6. Update on negotiations 

The UCU Exec will be piloting a members drop in to our Crawford house offices to ask questions and feed into our strategy or ask any questions. We have set two dates and hope that members will come to meet members of the Exec!

Session 1 – 12:30 -2pm Thu 3rd Oct, UCU Offices Crawford House, Booth Street East

Session 2 – 12:30-13:30 Wed 30th Oct, UCU Offices Crawford House, Booth Street East

We are hearing understandable discontent from our members about the new SEAtS system. Many of those concerns are practical, but the principal issue is a moral one. While communications from the University management have been insisting that the main impetus for SEAtS is to improve student welfare and academic engagement, this seems to be disingenuous. In fact, the information is being collected as a reaction to the last government’s ‘hostile environment’ policies that are, among other things, making the country more inhospitable for students on Tier 4 visas.

As justification, management have cited examples where institutions have been denied by the Home Office the right to offer international student places for having failed sufficiently to implement the legislation; hence, that UoM cannot afford to fall foul of the legislation. However, the legislation is unclear, and we believe that UoM is instead over-complying. 

The result is that we are now being made to engage with an oppressive monitoring system, whose data allows any member of staff the ability to track the movements of individual students across campus. We therefore think, by contrast, that this system operates to the detriment of student welfare. On top of this, the implementation of SEAtS generates yet another addition to academic workload, as well as the stress of carrying the responsibility for ensuring international students do not lose their places through inaccurate registration. Lastly, we have not been hearing reassuring news on the robustness of the system. It is quite possible it will manage to fall over entirely on its own terms.

Members of the UCU Exec have been trying to lessen the impact on students by explaining their opposition to the system. Click the link below to download some template slides that you may wish to adapt and use.

hostile-monitoring.pptx

Stockport Health Worker Alliance

A night of fundraising to support Medical Aid for Palestine

Stockport Labour Club SK4 1QP

Fri 18th October 2024 – Doors open at 7pm for 7.30pm start

Entertainment from Gerry O’Gorman and Dave Puller

Raffle, light snacks, disco and a staffed bar

Tickets £5 advanced or £8 on the door

For advanced tickets/info: funds4map@gmail.com

A branch delegates’ meeting has been called on Tuesday 24th September to get branches views on the UCEA pay offer for the 2024/25 pay round.

We would like your views, so will be holding a meeting on Wed 18th September 12.30-1.30pm

Join Zoom Meeting

https://zoom.us/j/95169124410

Passcode: 352412

Please make every effort to attend. If you can’t, but would like to share your views, please e-mail ucu@manchester.ac.uk Subject: 2024/25 Pay Round