Academics and support staff at the University of Cambridge will go on strike on 31st October, it has been announced.

The University staff who will be striking a week on Thursday are all members of Unite, Unison or the University and College Union (UCU), which voted in favour of the strike motion after being offered a one per cent pay rise for the next year.

The current rate of inflation is 2.7 per cent, meaning that employees are facing a decline in wages in real terms.  In the past few years, according to a statement from Cambridge UCU, staff wages have gone down by around 13 per cent. On average, 60 per cent of members across the three trade unions voted in favour of the strike.

Members from the three unions in Cambridge will meet in the next two weeks to discuss co-ordination of their separate strike actions. A statement from Cambridge UCU said that their members “have not rushed into this decision to take industrial action, and are very keen to see the dispute resolved without the need to take it”. They called on the University’s Vice-Chancellor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz to support their claim.

However a spokesman from the University reassured concerned students that academic life will continue as normal: “The numbers of staff involved in this strike are relatively small. The University will be ensuring there is no disruption to the students’ study.”