An investigation by Palatinate has uncovered the extent of department historical pay disparities for teaching activities. The average pay for demonstrating, tutorials, marking and lecturing varied by up to £44/hour between departments before an agreement to standardise payments was implemented in October. Until this academic year, significant proportions of undergraduate teaching activities, including demonstrating, tutorials, lecturing and marking, were covered by hourly wage workers on insecure ‘casual’ contracts, mostly performed by postgraduate students. Following a campaign by The University and College Union (UCU), and complaints raised by students to Vice-Chancellor Stuart Corbridge, Durham University and UCU came to an agreement last year to limit the use of casual contracts and standardise pay for similar work.