In England Minority Lecturers Face Discrimination
by
TAA Staff
UNIVERSITY LECTURERS from ethnic minorities earn less than
white lecturers, are less likely to have a senior job, and
their jobs are less secure, says a new report from the Association
of University Teachers (AUT) in Britain.
Nearly a quarter of white lecturers (24 percent) earn more
than £35,000 ($50,000) a year, compared with fewer than one
in 10 (8 percent) of black lecturers, and just over one in
10 (12 percent) for lecturers of Asian origin. At the other
end of the salary scale, fewer than a fifth of white lecturers
(17 percent) earn £20,000 ($28,000) a year or less. The figure
is exactly a fifth for black lecturers (20 percent) and more
than a quarter for Asian lecturers (28 percent.).
Asian lecturers are far more likely than others to be employed
on casual fixed-term contracts. Among full time academic staff,
nearly two thirds of white staff (64 percent) have permanent
contracts, compared to just over a third (37 percent) of Asian
staff.
Announcing the findings, AUT general secretary David Triesman
said:
“I am profoundly concerned by these shocking findings. Universities
seem to be treating ethnic minority lecturers as second class
citizens.
“We need to establish exactly why this is happening. Universities
sometimes claim that there is no discrimination, and that
ethnic minority lecturers fare less well because of factors
like age and experience. But existing research suggests that
even after controlling for length of service, the gap between
the number of white and non-white staff in senior posts remains,
and may even grow bigger.
“So our report is only a start. We have pinpointed the problem.
Now the university authorities and the government must commission
a much larger scale survey, so as to find out the cause of
the problem and eliminate it. “And I am calling on the vice
chancellor of every university in Britain to find out what
the situation is in his or her own university, and announce
publicly what steps will be taken to put it right.”
NOTES
1. The AUT report “Ethnicity, pay and employment in higher
education 1998/99” was prepared on the basis of figures from
the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA), and complements
a previous report produced last year by John Carter, Steve
Fenton and Tariq Madood (“Ethnicity and Employment in Higher
Education,” published September 1999 by the Policy Studies
Institute).
2. The AUT report “Ethnicity, pay and employment” is available
for download. For further information, contact the AUT Research
department (Stephen Court / David Watson, 020 7670 9700).
3. Association of University Teachers, the union and professional
body for all academic and academic-related staff in higher
education, has over 42,000 members in England, Scotland and
Wales.
