who is also on strike today alongside many thousands of academics.
The reasons for the strike are set out in an email on Daughter’s out of office email auto reply.
The University and College Union has called for industrial action to be taken between 22nd February and 16th March (inclusive). That action includes some days of full strike and some days of Action Short of a Strike (ASOS). The action has been called because of the dispute over the proposed changes to pensions that will leave academics and support staff on average £10,000 per year worse off. More information about the strike may be found here: https://www.ucu.org.uk/article/9242/UCU-anuniversities-in-pensions-row But the pensions issue is only one symptom of a broader problem around working conditions in universities. 50% of academic staff in UK Higher Education are on precarious contracts, meaning that they hold non-permanent posts or work on zero hours contracts (in some universities that figure is as high as 70%). Some undergraduate students are not taught by any permanent (tenured) members of staff throughout their degree, but instead are taught only by PhD students, visiting lecturers, and non-permanent teaching fellows. Universities have increasingly outsourced other jobs, such as for cleaning and maintenance services, resulting in those workers not receiving holiday pay, sick leave entitlement, or pensions from the university where they work. There are other crucial issues within the workplace, such as the very high incidences of ill-health amongst staff, the expectation of working on the weekends and evenings in addition to regular contracted hours, and the gender and race pay-gaps. I urge you to read about these if you are interested.
The purpose of this auto-reply is to inform you that during the 4 week period set out above, it is likely that emails received will not be actioned swiftly, and that some may not be actioned at all if they are time-sensitive. During this time, I will need to prioritise between competing work demands, as I will not be working outside of contracted hours and I might be on strike on some days. As such, if your email is urgent, please do resend with ‘urgent’ in the subject line, and I will endeavour to respond to genuinely urgent emails as soon as possible.
gfreedmanblog 
Thanks for posting this, Gill. None of the media sources give such detailed information as your blog.