University and College Union leader Jo Grady has accused her election opponents of taking private messages out of context and “seeking to frame” her social media usage as a breach of campaign rules.
Ewan McGaughey and Vicky Blake, who lost the vote to become general secretary two years ago, presented their complaints to the certification officer – a trade union watchdog – today alleging seven election violations.
The two opponents alleged that the UCU general secretary Jo Grady swayed the election in her favour by using union resources, such as social media accounts, contractors, email lists and staff, during the 2024 campaign.
WhatsApp message evidence also revealed Grady vented to senior colleagues that “every single” decision had to be seen with the lens of re-electing herself as general secretary and ridding the union of socialist worker party members (SWP).
Grady refuted all the allegations, adding that the messages were taken out of context, and her social media usage was part of her day job as the incumbent general secretary.
Jo Grady won the 2024 election for a second term with just a 15 per cent turnout and by 182 votes in the third round over McGaughey, a law professor at King’s College London.
Blake, a contextual outreach lead officer at the University of Leeds, came third, and Liverpool John Moores University senior education lecturer Saira Weiner came last.
The ballot was conducted by single transferable vote, where members select candidates in order of preference.
McGaughey and Blake alleged that these acts violated the unions’ 2023-24 elections guidance and applied to the Certification Officer to order a re-election.
Stephen Hardy, a relatively new Certification Officer (CO), has the power to make enforcement orders, which can include financial penalties and ballot reruns.
Social media views equalling votes
The case centred around a number of Grady’s online actions, which the applicants said breached rules that prohibited use of UCU resources for the purposes of campaigning.
They claimed Grady’s first campaign video was filmed in the UCU’s London head offices in November 2023 and garnered over 29,000 views on social media site, X.
Sarah Fraser Butlin KC, who represented UCU and Grady at the hearing, hit back that the applicants were comparing “apples with pears”.
“The comparison should be between a video taken in the office and a video not taken in the office,” she put to McGaughey.
He responded: “No, I don’t accept that, and I just come back to the point that it’s still using union resources, and there was a clear prohibition against that.”
UCU head of democratic services Catherine Wilkinson added in a witness statement she could not see how any advantage was “gained” to Grady from using this location.
Another alleged breach was Grady’s use of Mélinée Dufour, a union contractor and professional videographer, to make another campaign video the following month, which was viewed over 13,000 times.
In her cross-examination, Grady said the video was made out of hours during a lunchtime but admitted she wished she had declined Dufour’s offer.
“I don’t think it suggests that I either abused my position on that day, or that this suggests a pattern of doing so,” she said.
She was also alleged to have used union software, Streamyard, to broadcast her election videos, which was viewed over 2,041 times on the first day, and over 7,000 times afterwards.
The opponents also said that UCU was regularly reposting posts from Grady’s personal X account, directing traffic to her election campaign.
Former head of equality and policy Jenny Sherrard gave evidence that when Grady first came to power in 2019, there was an “embedded practice” of so-called cross-tweeting between different accounts to “amplify” the work of the union, which included retweeting UCU branch accounts as well as Grady’s.
McGaughey accused Grady of utilising her understanding of social media to direct people to her campaign.
“You understood that when UCU reposted your tweets, that would channel traffic to your personal account, and people would see your campaign materials. You understood that that was the effect of the social media policy, didn’t you?”
She said: “No, I don’t and I think that you are seeking to frame it that way.”
McGaughey stressed to the Certification Officer this all made it “capable” of swaying 182 votes or more.
“When you have so many views, then that’s got to be a significant factor that might sway people to vote,” he said.
In her cross-examination, Grady added that one-to-one conversations were likely to sway a vote to members not “random” social media posts.
“Views don’t equal votes,” she said.
“I think that there has been a real overstatement during this entire hearing so far of the […] the determining factor of social media in elections.”
Context matters
The applicants presented screenshots from a WhatsApp group chat with senior managers at the union, which showed Grady saying the following: “I know we are just chatting here, but from now on, every single decision we make/thing we do has to be seen through the lens: 1. Win dispute, 2. Re-elect GS, 3. Rid union of SWP.”
Grady accused the applicants of “partially quoting” from the group chat and said the exchange related to a “high-pressured” moment during its 2023 UCU Rising campaign, which sought cuts and casualisation in higher education.
“It’s about winning the dispute, and it’s about a broader conversation of the disruptive nature of the SWP in the union and I think you’ve really misrepresented the discussion,” she said.
‘Hijacked’ hustings
McGaughey and Blake also argued that Grady’s extra 13 emails to UCU members totalling over one million impressions and her solo visits to branches in Aberdeen and Northumbria were considered hustings for her campaign and therefore also breached the rules.
Grady said she visited the branches to discuss redundancies in her capacity as the incumbent general secretary and it would have been “really weird” for the event to be “hijacked” by election candidates.
“It would have been useful to have views from all of the candidates on how they would approach the really serious problems […] but all candidates weren’t given a level playing field, were they?” McGaughey said.
“The fact that you can’t understand that is just demonstrative of the fact that you’ve never done my job,” she retorted.
A further hearing to cross-examine remaining witnesses will be scheduled for a later date.
Hardy will make a decision within four weeks of the final hearing before publication.
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