Attempts to overturn the result of the 2024 University and College Union general secretary election have failed after the certification officer ruled Jo Grady’s election rule breach would not have affected the result.
The union watchdog rejected six of the seven complaints filed by Ewan McGaughey and Vicky Blake, who both stood against Grady for the top position.
In a decision published today, one complaint was partially upheld, but an order to re-run the election would be “inappropriate”.
UCU said the two former candidates should apologise to members for “wasting time and money” on fighting the case.
The battle centred on allegations that Grady swayed the election in her favour during her campaign by using union resources, such as social media accounts, contractors, email lists and staff. The two opponents demanded that the certification officer (CO) order a re-run of the election.
The CO, Stephen Hardy, accepted Grady’s evidence that her use of UCU’s corporate StreamYard account for a campaign broadcast was a “simple, human error”, which amounted to a technical breach of UCU’s election guidelines.
However, he refused to recognise that the wrongdoing swayed the election result or that it was enough to make an enforcement order to conduct the election again.
The decision said: “This broadcast was one of many that Dr Grady produced; it was also produced some two months before the election took place; and Dr Grady did not benefit from a wider audience than she would have done if she had used her own Stream Yard account,” the report said.
McGaughey and Blake also accused Grady of blurring the lines between her campaign activity and her official duties as incumbent general secretary.
They argued that videos, social media posts and emails sent from Grady to UCU members constituted as campaigning as they raised her profile under the guise of her day-to-day job and therefore breached election rules.
But the CO threw out the complaints after it became a “recurrent theme” that UCU and Grady had to continue “business as usual” during any election.
The two opponents also accused Grady of pressuring and threatening anonymous UCU employees to work for her re-election.
The complainants submitted WhatsApp message evidence, which showed Grady venting to senior colleagues that “every single” decision had to be seen through the lens of re-electing herself as general secretary and ridding the union of socialist worker party members (SWP).
But Grady vowed the messages were taken out of context and refuted all the allegations.
That complaint was also not upheld.
A UCU spokesperson said: “It is now a matter of public record that neither the union, nor its general secretary, systematically disregarded our own rules, as was claimed.
“The union has been vindicated but significant resources have been spent on this case – time as well as money. Resources our union wants to spend on saving jobs, tackling out of control workloads, guaranteeing better education funding, and delivering for UCU members.
“The complainants have a lot to answer for. The two losing candidates in this election should consider apologising to our members for wasting time and money on this.
“And those wishing to listen to gripes and conspiracy theories, rather than concentrating on the real story of a growing crisis in our sector and its effect on our members, their students and communities, should maybe pause for reflection.”
Blake said she was disappointed with the decision.
“It took two years to get to this point but I’m not sorry that we put the complaint in,” she said.
She added: “I was disappointed but not shocked that there was this repeated attempt to frame the case in factional terms and I think one of the really saddening things was the anonymous witness evidence was given little to no weight.
“It displaced the substance of the complaints.”
McGaughey added: “We always knew it was an uphill battle and the CO very rarely has ruled in favour of finding any breaches of union rules. It’s really disappointing because the union is in such a need to turn things around.”
Election win stands
The CO said he was “unconvinced” that the election outcome was swayed at all due to Grady having a “clear winning margin” in the first round of voting.
Jo Grady was re-elected as general secretary for a second five-year term in March 2024.
The ballot was conducted by single transferable vote, where members select candidates in order of preference.
Grady obtained nearly 6,000 votes in the first stage, compared to McGaughey’s 4,724, Blake’s 3,837 and Sara Weiner’s 2,580.
She ultimately won in the third round of voting by just 182 votes over McGaughey, who is a law professor at King’s College London.
In total, 17,131 valid votes were cast, with a turnout of 15.1 per cent of the UCU’s 114,310 eligible members.
Grady was elected with 7,758 votes to McGaughey’s 7,576.
Your thoughts