Personnel Today: UCU calls for 30-minute general strike for climate

The University College Union (UCU), which represents academics, lecturers, trainers, instructors, researchers, managers, administrators, computer staff, librarians and postgraduates in universities, colleges, prisons, adult education and training organizations across the UK, has tabled a motion at the upcoming Trade Union Congress (TUC) in Brighton for a 30-minute general strike on September 20th in solidarity with the Student Climate Strike, Personnel Today reports.

The proposed vote is a response to student activist, and student climate strike pioneer, Greta Thunburg's call for adults to take up the call of the students who have been walking out of classes on Friday's to draw attention to and spur action around climate change.

Unions affiliated with the TUC have 5.5 million members, but it is expected that non-affiliated workers may join the walkout.

If a walkout were to occur it would unlikely be unlawful, as it would not meet the strict requirements of British law to be a protected industrial action. Whether or not employees and the general public are receptive to the action may ultimately influence how and if it manifests. However, the labor movement was once built by unlawful and unprotected stoppages so the TUC's decisions may be more dependent upon the willingness of its members to repeat that history in the modern era.