Sheffield Hallam UCU branch along with a number of other universities paid for legal advice from a QC regarding the legal duties that must be met by our employers regarding face to face teaching.
If you are being pressured to teach on campus and don’t feel safe below is a form of wording that you can use to respond to your line manager’s request.
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Dear [line manager],
As you may know, I am a member of the UCU branch at SHU. I wanted to inform you that my branch has been advised by Jeremy Hyam QC about the legal duties that must be met by our employers if we are to teach face-to-face.
The SHU UCU branch was one of a number of UCU branches at a group of Universities that collectively sought legal advice from Leigh Day solicitors on, amongst other issues, the applicable law guiding a decision of a SHU employee who felt unsafe, due to COVID-19 risks, and who might need to refuse to deliver teaching in a particular face-to-face setting.
The legal advice received by our UCU branch is published here: https://www.leighday.co.uk/LeighDay/media/LeighDay/Advice-17-11-20.pdf?ext=.pdf
In this legal advice to our branches, Jeremy Hyam QC has explained that it is the duty of the University to:
(i) carry out a full, detailed and individualized (by method of delivery, location etc.) risk assessment;
(ii) in the light of such assessment to have done all that they reasonably can to reduce the risks of face to face teaching to the lowest level reasonably practicable
(iii) as a result of (i) and (ii), reduce the risk of Covid-19 transmission to a level that that, objectively, a person of reasonable fortitude would consider an acceptable level of risk for the teaching in question.
In this instance, with regard to my delivery of [insert details here], I feel that the element of concern is a failure to adequately [insert details of the concern, using (i), (ii) and/or (iii) above as appropriate].
I look forward to discussing this with you in more detail. But I wanted to let you know that on the basis of this legal advice, and my understanding of the arrangements for [insert details here], I will not be delivering [insert details here] face-to-face until I am sure the University has met the legal duties outlined above.
I hope you agree that I have given you reasonable notice of my decision to inform you of my refusal to deliver this particular teaching activity face-to-face. While I wait for your response I will plan to deliver this teaching online if possible [delete as applicable, depending on the teaching etc.].
Hoping this finds you very well,
Kind regards,