Sian joined the University of Greenwich as Professor in Employment Relations and Human Resource Management and Director of the Work and Employment Research Unit (WERU) in September 2015. She was previously Professor of Work and Employment Relations and Co-Director of the Centre for Employment Studies Research (CESR) at the University of the West of England. She was a Principle Research Fellow at the Centre for Employment Relations Innovation and Change (CERIC), University of Leeds, and prior to that a Reader at the Working Lives Research Institute (WLRI) at London Metropolitan University. Sian worked on the Leverhulme Future of Unions Programme at the London School of Economics and before that spent five years at the Labour Research Department. Previously she worked in local government and was a trade union activist in NALGO.
She studied for her PhD at Essex University; her thesis was on gender and class consciousness in industrialisation – a study of the Bradford Worsted industry 1780-1845 and she retains an interest in labour and women’s history.
Sian has published two books, ‘New Trade Union activists – class consciousness or social identity?’ (Palgrave Macmillan, 2011) and ‘Statutory regulation and employment relations’ with Sonia McKay and Sarah Veale (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), documenting the operation of the statutory trade union recognition procedure over ten years. Her work on statutory trade union recognition has resulted in commissioned reports for the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) and for Acas (the Arbitration and Conciliation Service). She has published a number of research reports for Unionlearn. More recently she was commissioned by the Low Pay Commission to undertake research on the pay and hours of homecare workers.
Jane Lethbridge’s main research interests are the impact of liberalisation and privatisation on the health and social care sector, digitalisation and the public sector, social dialogue in the health and social care sector and democratic professionalism in the public sector, in the UK and internationally.
She has worked on public health issues in the UK and internationally for over 20 years, with experience of management and project implementation in both the public and NGO sectors. From 2001-07, Jane was Senior Research Fellow, Public Services International Research Unit (PSIRU) at the University of Greenwich before becoming principal lecturer in 2007. She was Director of PSIRU from 2013-2018.
From 2012 -2019, she was part of the project PESSIS; ‘Promoting Employers’ Social Services in Social Dialogue’ (funded by the European Commission) which developed a series of national case studies of social dialogue in the social services sector in 25 European countries.
She was a researcher for the Council of European Municipalities and Regions (CEMR) / European Federation of Public Service Unions (EPSU) Joint Project 2015-2017 “New forms of service delivery for municipalities, the contribution of social dialogue and good practice for well-being at work.”
In 2019, Jane Lethbridge published ‘Democratic Professionalism in Public Services’ (Policy Press) explores democratic professionalism which is an approach that enables public service professionals to work more democratically with clients, students, patients and other public service users.
David Hall is a Visiting Professor in the Public Services International Research Unit (PSIRU), Faculty of Business, University of Greenwich. He researches the politics and economics of public services, public finance, privatisation and PPPs, in water, energy, waste management, healthcare and other sectors – globally, in Europe, and in the UK. He has published numerous PSIRU reports, articles in academic journals, book chapters, and two books, and spoken at many policy and academic conferences worldwide. From 2000-2013 he was Director of PSIRU.
Dr Emanuele Lobina specialises in the political economy of water service reform, governance and regulation in the global North and South. His more recent work reconceptualises public service efficiency and productivity and focuses on the international experience with remunicipalisation, or reverse privatisation. Dr Lobina has been awarded an ISRF Political Economy Fellowship (2017-2018). Over the last 20 years, his research has produced policy impact at the highest level, as documented in a University of Greenwich REF2014 Impact Case Study. He has an established track record of conducting commissioned policy research for and providing expert evidence to international organisations, national and local governments, utilities and their associations, trade unions and civil society organisations. He has been invited to speak at dozens of academic and policy events around the world and has considerable experience of disseminating research through the mainstream media.
After collaborating as a research associate with the Swiss Graduate School of Public Administration and the University of Siena in Italy, he joined PSIRU in 1998 and the University of Greenwich in 2000.
Vera joined the Public Services International Research Unit (PSIRU) at the University of Greenwich in September 2017. Her research is focused on public services, in particular privatisation, remunicipalisation, renationalisation, public sector financing and public sector reforms. While her research covers a wide range of public services across the world, she has focused on waste management and the circular economy, energy policy and the Just Transition as well as public transport. Her regional focuses have been Europe and Africa. Currently she is working on a research project analysing the lessons and opportunities of Covid19 for developing new approaches to public services.
Vera is also a member of the Centre for Research in Employment and Work (CREW) at the University of Greenwich. Her research is concerned with unemployment, unwaged and low-waged work, precarity and workers resistance. In her PhD entitled titled ‘Employability and the Rise of the No-Wage Economy: resistance to unpaid work in the United Kingdom’ she explored the ways in which unwaged and unrecognised workers organise. Her current research project is independent trade unionism and new ways of organising and recently (2019) won a BA/Leverhulme small grant. Vera’s research follows a Participatory Action Research methodology.
Vera has been involved in independent trade unionism in the UK since 2012, she is the co-founder of the United Voices of the Word union and has been involved in the creation of the Independent Workers of Great Britain union.
Safak joined University of Greenwich in October 2019 and PSIRU in October 2022. Prior to this, she worked as a Lecturer at the University of Manchester, Alliance Manchester Business School. She took research and teaching posts at University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany, Uludag University, Turkey and a visiting position at University of Strathclyde, Glasgow.
Her research interests lie in sociology of work, the changing nature of labour markets with a particular focus on precarious work and vulnerable workers. Her specific interests also include opposition, collective actions, governance and regulation gaps in global garment supply chains. The recent research project she conducted focused on the labour standards, working conditions and politics of worker opposition in the global garment industry looking at a supplier country (Turkey) with a focus on collective actions and social movements in their political and social context.
Since January 2020, she has been an expert committee member within the British Standards Institute (BSI) and has been working during the standard drafting process of ‘BS25700 Organisational Responses to Modern Slavery-Guidance’. During this work she has accomplished strategic impact of research on working conditions on supply chains through contribution to the committee with crucial aspects from her research which will have longstanding impact on the industry.
She has recently worked in several research project including two projects on changing nature of retail and logistics work and work on the supermarket front line in the COVID-19 pandemic.
Al-hassan researches public services and social movements with a focus on Africa. He co-authored with Kate Bayliss a book chapter titled “Where Have All the Alternatives Gone? The Shrinking of African Water Policy Options”. He has written several popular materials on water privatisation in Africa and several blogs on human rights to water and sanitation. Al-hassan joined the Public Services International Research Unit (PSIRU) in 2021 where he is pursuing a PhD degree. His research interest is on private equity investment in health systems.