Tomorrow (Thursday 10th May), UCU members with their pensions on the Teachers' Pension Scheme (TPS) will go on strike alongside members of PCS and Unite unions.  There is also a London-wide march from St Thomas’s hospital at 12 noon going to a rally at the Methodist Central Hall, Westminster 1pm, at which Oxford UCU President Terry Hoad is to speak. Although members at Goldsmiths are on the USS pension scheme, we still need to show solidarity. Members are encouraged in particular to join the picket lines at Lewisham College, Lewisham Way campus from 8am.

The elections in Greece and France, as well as the strength of the anti-Coalition vote here in the UK last week, have shown that resistance to a Neo-Liberal agenda of austerity has gained momentum. A statement from UCULeft, sent out today, reminded members that 'UCU members, like other Public Sector workers, have just suffered the first instalment of the "austerity tax" through increased pension contributions taken from our April pay. That is reason enough to get out on the picket lines and rallies tomorrow to make common cause with civil servants, hospitals and others, let alone the other cuts to our pensions which face us.'

More information, include live updates from strikers around the country, can be found at http://tps.web.ucu.org.uk/.

Government plans are threatening the health & safety legislation that protects people at work.

The Health & Safety Executive (HSE) has been told to remove half of all existing regulations by the end of the year. Although some of these are no longer relevant and the HSE had already planned to remove them, some will have an effect on safety in the workplace.

Examples include changing the regulations on reporting injuries, meaning that hundreds of thousands of injuries will no longer be reported and employers will be less likely to take action to prevent them. There are also plans to remove large numbers of self-employed people from health and safety laws, and to scrap regulations dealing with falls from height.

This could lead to Britain having some of the lowest levels of protection in Europe.

The Trade Unions Congress (TUC) has noted that this will encourage employers to take an uncaring attitude to Health and Safety, meaning that more and more workers will be put at risk, made ill and killed or injured at work.

TUC have called this 'part of a wider attack on workers rights' which will make it easier for employers to dismiss workers by making it harder (and more expensive) to take an employer to an employment tribunal, as well as making it more difficult to get compensation if you are injured.

More information can be found here, or in this leaflet

PLEASE EMAIL YOUR MP TODAY. It takes just a minute; a draft example letter that you can copy and paste can be found here.

UCU is using Workers Memorial Day (April 28) 2012 as a focus for resisting these changes.  Your MP may be unaware of these plans. Even a handful of emails from constituents would make your MP sit up and look at this issue. S/he ought to reply to you and justify how they intend to vote.

If you don’t know who your MP is, go to http://www.theyworkforyou.com/mp/

Please let us know of any response you get by email: gucu-admin@gold.ac.uk