On Wednesday, hundreds of lecturers took to the streets of Scotland to strike over pay. While college managers have said the union’s demand for a cost-of-living pay increase are unreasonable following a pay increase of 9 per cent on average due to harmonisation, members of EIS-FELA have said these are separate issues. Speaking in the Scottish Parliament’s education committee on the day of the strike, education secretary John Swinney said: “I don’t think it is defensible to separate harmonisation and cost of living as two separate things.”

In the days ahead of the industrial action, union and sector leaders clashed over the decision to strike and negotiation of the pay deal on offer.

Scotland’s FE minister, Richard Lochhead, pleaded with all parties to resolve the dispute in a spirit of “collaboration and cooperation”. He said that striking was in no one’s interest, least of all the students. “The Scottish government has invested heavily in Scotland’s colleges and is funding in full the additional costs of this harmonisation, which is helping colleges to deliver an average 9 per cent pay increase to lecturers over three years,” he said.

A deal to harmonise pay and protect core conditions was agreed in May 2017, but a cost-of-living increase was not. Colleges Scotland has rejected union demands on top of the 9 per cent average pay increase already agreed.

However, EIS general secretary Larry Flanagan said that when he had written to the umbrella organisation asking for a negotiation meeting, his request was refused.

“I understand that FELA negotiators have moderated our original cost-of-living claim, which now matches the deal agreed with support staff unions and should provide the basis for agreement to be reached,” he added.

“That cannot happen, however, unless management is at least prepared to come to the table. Why wouldn’t you?”

Shona Struthers, chief executive of Colleges Scotland, said that lecturers in Scotland were already the best paid across the UK and the current offer would bring the average salary up from £36,125 in April 2016 to £40,522 in April 2019.

“At the heart of this dispute is EIS-FELA’s refusal to recognise that the substantial pay increases awarded to most lecturers from the previously agreed ‘same pay’ deal represent a pay rise.

“They also want more pay for cost of living, but a pay rise is a pay rise, irrespective of whether it comes from the ‘same pay’ agreement or the additional cost-of-living offer,” she said.