Staff at Glasgow Caledonian University (GCU) are taking further strike action in a dispute over plans to cut up to 100 posts, with walkouts scheduled for 10, 12 and 13 November. The University and College Union (UCU) says its members will have struck for 20 days by the end of this action, after 11 days earlier in the autumn term.

The dispute centres on staffing plans announced earlier this year. Voluntary redundancies have brought the number of posts at risk down from around 100 to about 40, but compulsory redundancies remain possible, and the unions say management has refused to rule them out. On 15 October, all four campus trade unions walked out together for the first time in the university's three decades as a university.

UCU has challenged the financial case for the cuts, pointing to a £7.1 million improvement, from a projected £1.5 million deficit in March to a reported £5.6 million surplus for 2025/26. The union has also questioned the university spending £4.5 million on nearby land while staff face redundancy.

The dispute sharpened this week after reports that the university is advertising four senior posts, including director of international, director of marketing and communications, director of finance and pro vice-chancellor for education and student success. The university says three are existing roles recently vacated, and that restructuring its executive team has cut executive staff costs by 20%.

Union leaders say staff in student-facing services, including some of the lowest-paid colleagues, are among those affected, with some facing a pay cut from Grade 7 to Grade 4. The Educational Institute of Scotland warns GCU already has one of the worst staff-to-student ratios in the UK. The university says the unions have had weeks to present counter-proposals, and its focus remains supporting students and non-striking colleagues.