Actually reported in the New York Times! Maybe the coolest thing I found.

Excellent news - UCU must continue to open up our UK-wide structures so we can be more of a democratic, member-led union. Look forward to the disabled members, Black members and migrant members committees having a chance to input next week and hopefully progress this initiative.

We are delighted to report that this motion passed unanimously at both the Women Members' Standing Committee and LGBTQ+ Standing Committee meetings this morning. Three more standing committee meetings take place next week where the motion has been tabled. So pleased to have such wide support #UCU

Thanks @julietterowsell.bsky.social for covering the @statesofprecarity.bsky.social report launch event this week!

Fully believe the only university staff who can be (more than) adequately replaced by LLMs are senior managers. The higher up they are, the better.

Missing from the coverage of redundancies at Edinburgh: this was done in such a haphazard, uncoordinated way, there are now core teams who have gone from 5 people to 1 with no change in workload or pressure and huge loss in knowledge of institutional process. www.heraldscotland.com/news/2576321...

I had to look up Lizardman's Constant: the 4% of people who will tell a pollster lizard people are taking over the world, ie the minimum answer you will get for even the most absurd question.

Wes Streeting emphasising the NHS has adopted a 'holistic' model of care for trans kids. Please read this first peer reviewed article on what that looks like in practice: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Our first newsletter of 2026 has landed! Featuring information about our equality rule change motion, the current New Deal for FE strikes, Holocaust memorial day, and more. #UCU #UKHE ucucommons.org/ucu-commons-...

5% uplift north of the border. Some institutions will benefit more/less than others.

UCU members are on strike today in 25 colleges across the UK. Their starting salaries are just above minimum wage and well below their equivalents in schools and 6th form colleges. This has to change. Let our members know you back them.

Reminder that tomorrow (14 Jan) the @statesofprecarity.bsky.social Report Launch and Discussion will be held online, 1:00-2:30PM GMT. Guest speakers: @matildaf.bsky.social, @jaytoddgla.bsky.social, Lekan Adekola, @profgillian.bsky.social. Register here: www.rgs.org/events/upcom...

A new digital library full of manuscripts and incunabula to discover! 📜 #medievalsky #DigitalHumanities

We've written a motion to open up the nomination process to UCU's advisory equality standing committees, which is long overdue. This would bring it in line with that for our decision-making NEC. More details of the process and our reasons at the link. #UCU #UKHE ucucommons.org/rule-change-...

Allow me to give you yesterday's perfect headline, courtesy of FT:

The death of a legal observer in Minnesota by ICE is a warning to the UK in so many ways. We’re tying ourselves to a violent, corrupt, racist nation which does not care about its citizens. Reform believes in its model, Labour is appeasing it. It is the public who will suffer.

Bet I could get more than 5000 signatures on a petition banning all claims to Christian authority without a licence that required a stringent test on what Jesus actually bloody said about stuff, beyond bigotry-affirming cherry picking.

i mean look i hate to say it but actually there is a part of being a historian that can be outsourced to an LLM and that is our social media posts about why AI can’t do history

Additionally, I think the reason AI-credulous tech types find this so baffling is that tech has long been poisoned by a *disinterest* in this kind of rigor. Buzzwords like disruption and innovation leave people feeling like new things are better because they're new, and truth is market-driven.

"This promise of an AI future, is really just a collective anxiety that wealthy people have about how well they're gonna be able to control us in the future." - @tressiemcphd.bsky.social with an absolute mic drop moment about AI bullshit. Incredible words. Listen to all of it!

This details the costs of buying AI subscriptions at universities. Co-pilot, which my university subscribes to, is around $30 per month per user. No wonder budgets are tightening. Imagine if we took that money back from the slop peddlers and their boosters… www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

When those who hate trans people win - or pretend to win, cf Sandie Peggie - it's all over the media, even if it's just a tribunal decision. But when they lose, even in the Court of Appeal, it's absolute bloody tumbleweed. So here's our blog about Allison Bailey latest loss. goodlaw.social/3uyd

A new holiday tradition? A Santa, accompanied of course by his elves, robbed a major supermarket chain— and deposited $3,000-worth of food at the local food bank. www.ledevoir.com/actualites/9...?

Some really (and qualifiedly) good news from Cardiff UCU @cardiffucu.bsky.social : No redundancies next year, no downgrading of professional services staff. And all without the need for disruptive industrial action, which nobody at all wants. nation.cymru/news/cardiff...

AI boosters: AI can teach us so much about history. Historians and Archaeologists: Errrrm, guys... www.france24.com/en/technolog...

Solidarity with Northumbria UCU as they continue their fight against a management hellbent on cutting their pensions and pay. Good to see lots of ballots being sent in!

Interesting demonstration of BBC bias in this article. TransActual and Translucent simply referred to as “trans rights organisation” or “transgender advocacy group”, whilst Sex Matters get the title of “human rights organisation”, despite actively arguing against trans people having them.

Our final newsletter of 2025: BDM report, UCU Congress timing survey, news from UCU, UK HE and Australian HE! See you all in 2026!

As things wind down for the holidays, @sheffielducu.bsky.social members are facing a threat of 100% pay deductions from January, thanks to our Scrooge-like management. We’ve now set up a fundraiser to bolster our local solidarity fund. If you can spare some change, please do! gofund.me/ac2b3adcb

The boy Les is so convinced that the general public will take the side of a loathsome little politician toad like him and not the side of…Actual Junior Doctors that look after us all day-in-day-out. That’s some level of ego from a man with a majority of less than 500.

Maybe if you hadn't interfered into stuff you don't understand, Hannah, they wouldn't have to.

Vital piece on how the OfS Sussex fine and the Supreme Court ruling have created an even more hostile environment for trans people in UK universities. As Chris Parkes says: if the expected EHRC guidance is adopted, "people are going to get hurt". 1/2

Our BDM report is now available on our website. If you're a newsletter subscriber you'll get it in your inbox on Wednesday morning. #UCU Not a subscriber? Subscribe here: ucucommons.org

Blessings upon the student who turned in an essay with the file name "ESSAY.LAST ONE (the right one) (for real).PDF"

An insight into the process happening at Essex: My brilliant colleague Lucy Noakes is*President of the Royal Historical Society* and is still, like me, officially "at risk" of redundancy.

This is Charles Clyde Ebbets, the photographer who took the iconic “Lunch atop a Skyscraper” picture. Look at this fearless, dapper fuck wearing spats, suspenders, and a tie 850 feet above the ground. Absolute legend.

Initial thoughts on a HE car-crash: first proper post on my Substack. Part 1 of a million, probably, where I get very annoyed about bad decisions taken by UCU.

Congrats to the NTEU for this vindication of their campaigning on governance failures in Australia’s university sector. Lots for us in @ucu.org.uk to learn about convincing people and governments of the damage caused by the long term attacks on the primary teaching and research functions of unis.

Now do the UK! www.abc.net.au/news/2025-12...

“Union-Busting Tactic” The University of Sheffield argues staff who do not replace missed teaching due to strike action are in breach of contract, and so should forfeit an *additional* two weeks of pay. #UKHE #AcademicSky

The only person to come out of the SPeggie/NHS tribunal vindicated and with a completely untarnished reputation is Dr Beth Upton. Not SPeggie, Not the NHS management, Not Four Women Scotland, Not the media, Just Dr Upton.

'Skull of St. Thomas Aquinas being transported to Fossanova Abbey.' Photograph by Daniel Ibanez

Some important points about the latest gender critical court defeat: www.thenational.scot/news/2568550...

Also worth noting, the Tribunal found that Sandie Peggie had harassed Dr Beth Upton in a "hate incident".

She won her case like you won the general election.

Today’s judgment in the Sandie Peggie case says exactly what we have been saying – For Women Scotland does not require a trans bathroom ban:

Mini thread on the ET decision in Peggie Top line: It says exactly what we have been saying for months. The decision of the Supreme Court was not to turn the Equality Act 2010 into a nationwide bathroom ban - regardless of how anti-trans organisations have sought to misrepresent the law. 🧵👇

This is important because it will be spun as a victory despite it being a resounding failure for the transphobes.

Those of us under £100,000 pa keep getting told we have to do more with less because the sector is in crisis. It doesn’t seem in crisis for those n six-figure salaries though? The Principal got yet another £5,000 bump, and the 140-150,000 bracket exploded. www.finance.qmul.ac.uk/media/financ...