To say the last 12 months have been challenging for Scotland’s college students would be an understatement.

The current period of disruption began in May 2023, when the EIS Further Education Lecturers’ Association (EIS-FELA), a trade union for college lecturers, launched a student results boycott amid a still-unresolved dispute over pay.

Colleges have since been hit by successive national and targeted strike days which began at the start of the 2023/24 academic year. These have involved the EIS-FELA and, sometimes, members of the UNISON and Unite support staff unions. Stoppages by the EIS-FELA are currently happening on a rolling basis at individual colleges and are scheduled to continue until this Friday.

A second EIS-FELA results boycott is also ongoing after its launch in February this year. It means significant potential risks for learners who want to access a university place, secure progression in an apprenticeship, or advance into employment.

College Employers Scotland (CES), the representative body for colleges as employers, understands there is considerable frustration among those trade union members taking part in industrial action. Everyone has just lived through some of the steepest cost-of-living increases in decades – now thankfully abating – and college staff have not had a pay rise since July 2022.

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That is why employers have offered a deal to trade unions which, if accepted, would provide a £5,000 consolidated pay rise over three academic years. This would deliver an 11.5% average pay increase for college lecturers from September. College lecturers at the start of the unpromoted scale would get a rise of 14.2%. At the same time, support staff would see their pay jump by nearly 16% on average, with employees who earn less than £25,000 enjoying an increase of 21.5%.

This is a significant pay offer, as evidenced by the fact it has been overwhelmingly accepted by members of Unite and GMB.

Colleges have tabled this pay offer despite seeing their budgets reduced by 8.5% in real terms since 2021/22, and with an additional cash cut of £32.7 million under the Scottish Government’s 2024/25 Budget. In such a context, and with costs continuing to rise, increasing the current pay offer is simply not possible.

Trade union leaders now make regular calls on government to step in and fund a better offer – a clear sign they understand the unprecedented financial pressure on colleges, and that the sector has no more money to increase staff pay awards. 

However, given their focus is on convincing ministers to provide additional funding for an improved pay settlement, it would be completely wrong for trade unions to continue making colleges and students the targets of their ire through industrial action.

College leaders feel strongly that their learners should not be caught in the crossfire of a seemingly never-ending dispute that is actually between trade unions and government – not between trade unions and colleges.

Students have already been hit by significant upheaval and uncertainty due to Covid, and have since had their education further destabilised by strikes and a results boycott last year. Additional strikes, and a fresh refusal to input results, will only lead to students experiencing more disruption to their learning through absolutely no fault of their own.

Which brings us back to the trade unions’ ultimate target: the Scottish Government. Successive Ministers and Cabinet Secretaries have repeatedly made it clear to parliament, college leaders and the unions themselves that government will not find additional money to fund a higher pay award for college staff. While this position is unpalatable to trade unions, it is, in fact, the reality that colleges find themselves operating in.

So, while trade unions may want to continue pushing government to fund a better pay award than the college sector itself can afford, using strikes and a resulting boycott as their leverage, it may benefit them to reflect on how realistic their prospect of success is – and on the damage ongoing industrial action will cause to colleges and learners in the meantime.

For College Employers Scotland, the quickest way to resolve the current pay dispute would be for the EIS-FELA and UNISON to ballot their members on the employers’ full and final offer.

Gavin Donoghue, is the Director, College Employers Scotland