Members belonging to the University and College Union (UCU) have rejected the option to strike alongside the National Union of Teachers (NUT) in July.

The Times Educational Supplement (TES) reports the row over pay was a topic that split delegates at the UCU's Further Education conference, which was held yesterday (May 29th) in Manchester.

A final meeting is due to be held in the middle of next month after two previous attempts to try to come to an agreement with the Association of Colleges over how much its members should receive for the job they do.

However, the decision not to take industrial action represents something of a blow to the NUT, which has provisionally organised the walkout for July 10th to coincide with a series of public sector strikes.

Originally, union bosses had threatened to take their members out of the classroom, but withdrew their stance in favour of giving the government more time to work with them to come to a solution.

This has proven to be something of a relief for parents of children who are due to take their GCSE exams next month, as some pupils would have been sitting their tests at the time of the original walkout.

The debate over whether or not the UCU was going to join in appeared to be a heated one. Speaking to the TES, one delegate labelled Ofsted "pernicious", before calling for members to "take control" of the situation to resolve the issues around their working conditions.

Other attendees were loath to rule out the possibility of future action, stating they "had to be prepared to use the strike weapon".

However, others argued a strike would only result in the union losing its credibility. Instead, campaigning and continued negotiating won out to be the preferred outcome.

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