College lecturers strike over pay

College lecturers will go on strike today in a long-running dispute over pay and conditions.

The Educational Institute of Scotland (EIS) said members would walk out over the refusal of college management to honour a deal that was reached more than a year ago.

The agreement promised equal pay for lecturers in all colleges and national terms and conditions following years of inequity for lecturers doing the same jobs in different colleges, the EIS said.

The strike comes after a 96% vote in favour of the action in a recent ballot of Further Education Lecturers’ Association (EIS-FELA) members.

More than 4,600 members are eligible to take part in the strike, which will affect about 20 institutions.

EIS general secretary Larry Flanagan said: “After more than a year of waiting and watching college managers talk down the agreement that they freely signed up to, Scotland’s further education lecturers have simply had enough. All that lecturers are asking is for the deal that was agreed by both sides to be honoured. Sadly, rather than working to deliver their commitments, college management have spent the last 13 months attempting to rewrite history and airbrush this binding agreement while simultaneously denigrating the hardworking lecturing staff in their colleges.”

The EIS said the walkout is the first day in an escalating programme of strike action. A further one-day action is planned for next Wednesday, escalating to two days per week and then three days per week unless the deal is honoured.