Job cuts on table at city college group

The Chichester College Group has confirmed it is considering job losses in its English and maths departments.

A spokesman confirmed the group – comprising colleges in Chichester, Worthing, Haywards Heath , Brinsbury and Crawley – was consulting staff over the proposed redundancies which will affect maths and English lecturers.

Chichester College University and College Union (UCU) has raised serious concerns about the plans and has received support from a number of councillors.

Chichester College Group said if redundancies are made, it would work ‘very hard’ to redeploy staff. A Chichester College spokesman said: “Chichester College Group (CCG) can confirm it is currently undertaking a consultation with staff who teach maths and English. As with any staff consultation, this is a meaningful two-way process where we engage with employees and their representatives to explain planned changes and get their feedback and input on proposals.”

The spokesman said the group, along with all further education colleges, had faced significant challenges with the funding for state funded provision having ‘fallen by circa 30 per cent in real terms over the past ten years’.

The spokesman said the pressure required a continuous culture of seeking efficiencies and savings and in the past, the group had relied on its commercial businesses to subsidise this shortfall.

The spokesman added: “Unfortunately, one of the impacts of Covid-19 has been that a significant amount of this commercial income has fallen away and will take a number of years to return. This has left the group in a position where we are forecast to make a significant deficit in 20/21.

“Our financial health and sustainability are critical and, in order to address this, we have had to seek savings and efficiencies across our business. As part of these necessary savings, we are consulting on reducing the cost of delivery in our maths and English provision.

“Our proposal seeks to find alternative ways to deliver teaching to those who need to retake their GCSE maths and English. The revised model that we are proposing does entail some job losses but we believe it will still provide our learners with the quality teaching and support they need to further their attainment in these areas.

“If we do have to make redundancies then, as always, we would work very hard to redeploy any staff who lose their jobs.”