Dear Colleague,

Many of you will by now be aware of the escalating situation at Keele University. You may have received my message yesterday via your branch officers or the activist list so apologies if you have already received this. However, given the gravity of the situation I am taking the seldom used action of emailing the whole UCU membership in order that all are aware of the situation and are able to support our colleagues at Keele. Many thanks for taking the time to read this and for your patience if you have already received.

Greylisting of Keele to begin Friday 13 June

Greylisting is the ultimate sanction available to UCU members and is only ever used where a university or college refuses to engage in meaningful negotiations with a branch or local association.

We are now asking colleagues in UCU, other trade unions, labour movement organisations and the international academic community to support our members in any way possible to bring management back to the table.

The term greylisting specifically means a voluntary boycott of academic and other university activities where appropriate at Keele.

Arising from the university's attempts to make 38 academic staff compulsorily redundant without meaningful negotiations, and now management's threats to deduct 25% of salaries a day from those taking part in ongoing lawful industrial action, Keele members are seeking the following from management:

• engage in meaningful negotiations with the branch and regional officials
• remove the threat of pay deductions relating to the ongoing action short of a strike (ASOS)
• commence the engagement of academic managers with teaching groups in discussion about future teaching programmes
• agree an acceptable process for voluntary severance - including an extension to the time period of the current scheme.

Colleagues are asked to show their support for Keele UCU in particular in the following ways with effect from Friday 13 June, 2008:

• do not attend, speak at or organise academic or other conferences at Keele
• do not apply for jobs at Keele
• do not give lectures at Keele
• do not accept positions as visiting professors or researchers at Keele
• do not write for any academic journal which is edited from Keele
• do not take up new contracts as external examiners for taught courses.

When you decide to support Keele UCU as above, make sure you tell management that you are participating in the greylisting and notify mailto:campaigns@ucu.org.uk

If you are currently or soon to be involved in any activity as above on or after 13 June please contact UCU campaigns team at mailto:campaigns@ucu.org.uk and we will provide guidance on how to support colleagues.

We need your help, urgently, to mobilise members and others to support the boycott if the university refuses to budge. Please forward this email to all members within your local association/branch, and encourage them to forward to others both in and outside the university. Every member is affected, every member must take part. Our ability to defend and advance our pay and conditions across higher and further education is dependent on our willingness to defend our colleagues.

Here are some things you can do right now to get the campaign off to a flying start:

** sign the petition calling on managers to stop the cuts and negotiate: http://www.ucu.org.uk/keelepetition

** write to Times Higher Education (THE) - mailto:letters@tsleducation.com - and The Guardian - mailto:letters@guardian.co.uk - outlining your support for the academic boycott at Keele and calling on management to negotiate with the local association officers.

** show solidarity now - send an individual message of support to UCU members at Keele by emailing them to mailto:campaigns@ucu.org.uk

** go straight to the top - email Professor Janet Finch, the vice-chancellor at Keele, to tell her that you will be supporting the academic boycott and asking her to begin negotiations immediately. E-mails should be polite, and to the point and should be sent to: mailto:j.v.finch@vco.keele.ac.uk and copied to Justine Stephens at mailto:jstephens@ucu.org.uk. Please also forward any replies to Justine.

** raise awareness - pass this email on to all your members, write an article for your university newsletter, raise the issue at your local union branch and get your branch or LA to write to the vice-chancellor, outlining your support for the boycott. If you would like a speaker on the dispute for a meeting, email Justine Stephens at mailto:jstephens@ucu.org.uk

Yours fraternally

Sally Hunt

UCU general secretary