Job cuts announced at a secondWelsh university
Job cuts have been announced at a second university in Wales. A day after the University of South Wales announced 139 jobs were being cut, the University of Wales Trinity St Davids comfirmed it has sent letters to all teaching and support staff seeking voluntary redundancies.
UWTSD – whch has campuses in Carmarthen, Lampeter and Swansea, as well as satellite campuses in Cardiff and London – has not revealed a target number. However, Unison, which represents staff there, said management hope to make savings of around 10%. The union fears compulsory redundancies are “inevitable if the university does not receive enough volunteers”.
In a statement, Unison said: “The University of Wales, Trinity St David has written to all teaching and support members of staff asking them to consider voluntary redundancy.”
Mike Dyer, from the union, added: “We know there are big changes ahead at the university and a likely merger of sites. We’ll work with them to identify savings if they need to be made, but that should not be at the cost of frontline workers.
“An obvious start would be to stop recruiting highly-paid management staff. Over the last few years, more senior managers have been recruited on lucrative contracts, leaving fewer staff to teach and support students. Many support staff earn near to the minimum wage, and zerohours contracts and agency work are still common practice.
“It is essential the quality of learning and student support is protected and we want the University of Wales Trinity Saint David to be open and honest about the scale of the challenge it faces and engage constructively with Unison to minimise any impact on staff.”
The job losses come against a backdrop of falling applications from home, UK, EU and worldwide students as well as end to a generous blanket grant for Welsh students.
A UWTSD statement said: “As part of its normal ongoing business practice, the university regularly reviews its staffing costs in line with sector benchmarks. The university’s current staffing costs are above sector benchmark comparisons and therefore a review of staffing levels across all academic and professional units is being undertaken.
“To this end, the university has launched a voluntary redundancy scheme with the aim of reducing staffing costs as a percentage of turnover, and has met recently with recognised trades unions to appraise them of the situation.”
There has been an 8% drop in applications to study at universities in Wales from students across the UK and the EU, figures from universities admissions service UCAS revealed. Domestic applications from Wales have also fallen 7% – the steepest decline of any UK nation – against a backdrop of universal tuition fee grants being scrapped.
Universities Wales, which represents the sector, and University College Union, which also has members at UWTSD, declined to comment. Universities Wales said it won’t comment on individual institutions and UCU said it has not yet had a chance to speak to members.
Simon Dunn, from Unison: “We recognise the financial challenges being faced by a number of universities in Wales, with the recent news of significant job losses in the University of South Wales.
“Given the economic value of higher education to Wales and local communities, we call on Welsh Government to consider how universities are responding to these challenges, and whether some form of intervention is necessary.”
A Welsh Government spokesperson said: “We are aware of the situation at University of Wales Trinity Saint David. We would expect for there to be a period of consultation, and that staff and unions are kept informed at all stages in the process.”