the university's investments in Israel as being "dressed as terrorists".
==== Industrial disputes ====
In the summer of 2017, dozens of campus cleaners contracted via Noonan Services went on weekly strikes, protesting outside key buildings and causing significant disruption during end-of-year examinations. The dispute organised by the UVW union was originally over unfair dismissals of cleaners, but had escalated into a broad demand for decent employment rights matching those of LSE's in-house employees. Owen Jones did not cross the picket line after arriving for a debate on grammar schools with Peter Hitchens. It was announced in June 2018 that some 200 outsourced workers at the LSE would be offered in-house contracts.
Since 2014/15, levels of academic casualisation have increased at the LSE, with the number of academics on fixed-term contracts increasing from 47% in 2016/2017 to 59% in 2021/2022, according to Higher Education Statistical Agency data (internal LSE data puts the latest figure at 58.5%). During this same period, comparable universities such as University of Edinburgh, University College London and Imperial all increased their rates of permanent staff relative to those on fixed term contracts. Only Oxford had a higher proportion of casual academic work for the 2021/2022 year (66%) although in contrast to LSE, the proportion remained constant rather than rising. As a result, the student-to-permanent staff ratio at LSE has worsened and had, as of July 2023, the worst student-to-permanent staff ratio among comparable universities in the UK, according to HESA data. According to research conducted by the LSE UCU Branch into staff well-being, 82% of fixed term academic staff at the LSE experienced regular or constant anxiety about their professional futures. In the same survey, overwork and mental health issues were reported as endemic among respondents, with 40% of fellows reporting that their teaching hours exceeded LSE's universal teaching limit of 100 hours per academic year for LSE Fellows.
In response …
