Tayside college classes cancelled as lecturers strike again
It's the fifth day of strike action this year.
College lecturers across Scotland will walk out on Wednesday and Thursday this week, as a long-running dispute over pay continues.
It affects classes at Dundee and Angus as well as Perth College UHI.
Members of EIS-FELA union have already staged four days of strike action this year.
Talks last week and at the start of this week with Colleges Scotland failed to reach a resolution.
EIS General Secretary Larry Flanagan said, "There has been a distinct lack of meaningful negotiation from Colleges Scotland, and a lack of urgency on their part to resolve this dispute."
"Lecturers will be on the picket lines in force on Wednesday and Thursday at colleges across Scotland, and are also continuing with action short of strike including a boycott of college results systems."
"The EIS would urge colleges to come back to the negotiating table, ready to engage in talks on a meaningful basis, so that we can agree a fair pay settlement that will allow lecturers to return to working normally in support of students across the country."
Interim Director of Employment Services for Colleges Scotland Employers’ Association, Heather Stevenson, said: “The EIS-FELA is continuing with its strike action and is demanding that lecturers have an automatic right to a four-day week in college and get paid almost £42,000.
“Colleges have put a generous package on the table which would take over 90% of unpromoted lecturers to £41,426 and provide all lecturers with the right to request flexible working arrangements, but colleges could never grant this an automatic entitlement for up to seven hours a week for all lecturing staff. That would be simply unsustainable for the college sector and adversely affect students.
“Colleges are doing everything we can to end this dispute for the sake of students. The EIS-FELA should not be attacking students in this way by striking during exams and withholding students’ assessment results, but colleges are mitigating the impact of their action and we are confident their attempts to cause maximum disruption will not succeed despite them paying their members to go out on strike."