A move by UCD to require all staff to work on site at least three days a week has been criticised as inflexible and unnecessary by Siptu, which has lodged a case with the Workplace Relations Commission on the issue.
UCD’s policy since the start of Covid had been that decisions on remote and hybrid working were taken by line managers based on requirements in particular areas of the university, the union said.
The result was that while many staff are on site five days a week, some work entirely remotely and others have a range of mixed hybrid arrangements.
In May, however, both Siptu and the Irish Federation of University Teachers (Ifut) were informed that the rules were to be changed and despite attempts to have the move delayed pending further engagement, staff were told the policy was coming into effect last month, with provisions made for those who believed they were “disproportionately affected” to request 12-month exemptions.
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Siptu organiser Cathie Shiels said, however, that fewer than 50 per cent of staff have fully engaged with the changes to date, and many local arrangements persist. The union is concerned that members could be left vulnerable to disciplinary action.
At a meeting of the union’s members last week, she said, many were angry about the changes, arguing that the three-day figure is arbitrary with little or no reference to actual local requirements or how workloads vary hugely at different times of the year.
“Under the pilot scheme that was implemented during Covid and kept being extended, it was basically up for the local manager to decide who they needed on site and when. And that had been working really well for the last five years,” said Ms Shiels.
“Now we have all these line managers, a lot of whom are our members too, having to turn around to their teams and tell them: ‘You know that system that we’ve been operating for the last five years? Well, it’s not meeting the needs of the business any more so you all have to be on site three days a week. And it doesn’t matter if it’s July when there’s no students about. You have to be on site three days a week. But in September, when it’s really busy, you might have to be on site five days a week.’
“They’re as frustrated as anyone else.”
She estimates that as many as 750 of the union’s 900-strong membership among staff could be affected by the changes, with some, those with particularly long commutes or women with young children, affected more than others. Those who have to drive to the Belfield campus will also be affected by increased demand for car parks she says are already full by early morning.
“The whole way through the negotiations, we’ve flagged the need to be flexible with this. Some staff already come in five days because their work requires it, and others can come in when required.
“But the university has peak and offpeak times, and we’ve asked: ‘Would you not allow flexibility? Whether it was across the year, rather than across the week, there are loads of ways that you could just include a little bit of flexibility here that would make sense.”
She said the union is continuing to seek amendments to the process through college procedures and now, through the WRC. Ifut says its lecturer members are not generally affected by the changes as they already have to be on campus to teach a lot of the time but it has some administrative members who will be affected and the union will also attend any WRC meetings as, it says, any change should be by agreement.
UCD was contacted for comment.
