About 8,000 members of New Zealand's Tertiary Education Union walked off the job on Wednesday afternoon in the first coordinated strike by staff at universities and polytechnics in the country's history, according to the Times Higher Education. The half-day stoppage ran from 1:15pm to 5:00pm as end-of-year exams got underway at institutions including Victoria University of Wellington and Massey University.
TEU national secretary Amy Ross said pay offers from employers came nowhere near meeting the cost-of-living crisis, but that job security was just as big an issue. "At universities just over half of the workforce are on fixed-term or casual employment agreements," she said. "You cannot build excellent teaching and research on insecure, overstretched staff," she told Times Higher Education.
The union says polytechnic negotiations have dragged on for ten months, with some employers refusing to engage in the multi-employer collective agreement and trying to change its structure and conditions instead. Lecturers, librarians and administrators joined the action, which the TEU says is a historic first: never before have university and polytechnic staff struck together, according to the union.
The timing put pressure on students sitting exams, though universities said no specific examinations had been cancelled. With a general election due on November 7, the TEU is demanding that political parties commit to a long-term investment plan for tertiary education. "If we want to live in a country that supports us all with enough quality nurses, builders, teachers, doctors, engineers and other skilled professionals, then we need to value the people who teach them," Ross said.
The action landed during a sensitive period for students. Victoria University's end-of-year examination period runs from October 16 to November 7, while Massey University's study period runs October 19 to 23 before examinations begin on October 27, according to Wellington News. Students were advised to check their personal timetables and course messages rather than assume arrangements had changed.