University staff sound alarm at Brexit impact
STAFF at Cardiff University say they are getting anxious about Brexit. More than 250 members of staff from nearly all academic schools and the professional services have signed an open letter to vicechancellor Professor Colin Riordan detailing negative consequences they foresee for Cardiff University should Brexit go ahead as currently planned by the government.
They say they are worried the university will no longer be able to attract high calibre students and staff from outside the UK, will lose significant EU funding, and see academic freedom curtailed via travel restrictions imposed on staff and students.
They also write that they are aware of several colleagues who have already left Cardiff University because of Brexit, and are worried about future staff retention.
“The university is already operating under a reduced budget, and further economic downturn associated with Brexit would hit the university particularly hard, because of further budget cuts, as well as potential drops in student numbers,” they say.
The signatories reveal the diverse nature of Cardiff University staff. Some are British citizens, some are EU nationals from the other EU countries, some are from outside the EU. They are also at different points in their careers with some young and on temporary contracts and others are wellestablished.
They say they are “united in seeing Brexit as a serious threat to their careers, their personal wellbeing, and to Cardiff University as an institution”.
They call on Professor Riordan, who clearly declared his pro-European views in the run-up to the referendum, to re-iterate these views now and say it is the university’s duty to call out the untruths and mis-directions that surround the Brexit debate.
Pointing out that there are only 200 days until Brexit, Professor Matthias Eberl from the School of Medicine and signatory of the letter said: “Science and education do not play prominent roles in the Brexit debate. But the UK risks being cut off from vital funding streams, training programmes and international networks, and losing access to regulatory bodies like Euratom and the European Medicines Agency and technologies like Galileo.
“Limiting free movement of people will affect staff and student recruitment to the UK and career opportunities abroad. All this will have dire consequences for research, education and innovation.
“It is also worth remembering that more than three million EU citizens in the UK and more than one million British people across the EU are stuck in legal limbo since the referendum, together with their families and partners.”
Dr Niek Buurma, senior lecturer in chemistry originally from the Netherlands, said: “The Brexit debate is still ongoing, indicating that Brexit is not a done deal. But much of the vital information such as simple facts and honest risk assessments was absent in the prereferendum debate.
“It is essential that this information is made widely available to ensure informed public debate, and I would like to see Cardiff University as well as other universities across the UK contribute to the debate much more than they have done thus far.”
Amanda Thomson, a British PhD student researching cancer immunotherapy, wants more information on how Brexit will affect academia, saying: “I want to work with the best scientific minds, regardless of their EU status and am concerned Brexit will discourage those minds from coming to this country. Furthermore, what impact will Brexit have on funding opportunities for early career scientists? This is already an extremely competitive process that could be made more difficult.
“I believe the university has a responsibility to address these concerns and to provide us with clear information on such issues. Ultimately, advances in research are made when diverse networks of people work together and I hope Cardiff University will ensure that Brexit does not prevent this from happening.”
Professor Marc Buehner, a dual British-German national, warned: “There are countless impact assessments and reports that show devastating consequences of Brexit. We have yet to see a single assessment or report that cites any improvement, economic or otherwise.
“It is now time to stop viewing Brexit as an inevitability and reassess whether we as a nation want to go down this route. We are calling on our vice-chancellor to join the growing number of voices for a public vote on the final deal.”
A Cardiff university spokesman said: “We received the open letter on Monday, September 10, and will respond to the detailed points raised within it in due course.
“We are acutely aware of the impact of Brexit on our European staff and are committed to doing all we can to support them.
“Cardiff University is an international community that values staff who come to work here from around the world.
“We have around 600 staff from non-UK EU countries. This diversity fosters creativity and innovation and is an important part of our culture. This will not change because of Brexit.” Dear Professor Riordan,
We are writing to you to express our concern about Brexit. We are a diverse group of staff members.
Some of us are European nationals, some are from outside the EU.
Some of us are British citizens, some are not. Some of us are established senior academics, some are junior and at the beginning of their careers. But we are all united in the belief that Brexit poses a serious threat to our careers, us personally in terms of well-being, to Cardiff University as an institution, and therefore, to its staff and students.
Briefly, we believe that leaving the EU, especially along the lines currently laid out by the British government, will leave our university much less competitive than it currently is. In no particular order, and without going into great detail, we are concerned that our university, along with most other UK universities, will:
■ Lose (or at a minimum reduce) its ability to attract overseas students;
■ Lose (or at a minimum reduce) its ability to attract high calibre staff from outside the UK;
■ Incur staff retention problems – we are already aware of several EU27; colleagues leaving their appointments and citing Brexit as one of the reasons;
■ Lose significant if not all funding streams from the EU;
■ See serious curtailment of academic inquiry via restriction of staff and student movement across the EU, due to travel restriction and loss of access to exchange schemes;
■ Incur further financial shortfalls due to Brexit-induced economic downturn leading to further pressures on government finances;
■ Poorer economic outlook leading to drops in student numbers;
■ Financial insecurity as a result of fluctuations in the value of the pound against the euro.
It is our perception that Cardiff University has kept a remarkably low profile since the referendum in speaking out against threats to our institution, and against the antiintellectual and indeed openly hostile approach of those that are supposed to deliver the “best possible Brexit” for us.
We believe Cardiff University should take a more prominent, vocal, and pro-actively pro-European stance, both internally and externally. In the run-up to the referendum, you repeatedly made your views clear that you believe that we are better off inside the EU.
We would like you to reiterate those views internally as well as declaring publicly that Cardiff University would suffer from Brexit. With this in mind, we are asking you to make publicly available any impact assessments carried out by Cardiff University with respect to Brexit to inform the ongoing public debate and restore transparency.
We hope that Cardiff University will be a visible and pro-active voice within the wider public debate, both as a long-standing beneficiary of freedom of movement and as an advocate for its preservation.
We ask that you as our vicechancellor continue to make the case – both to the Welsh and British governments as well as publicly – for the importance of academic mobility and the UK’s continued participation in the Erasmus+ and Horizon 2020 programmes and their successors.
At the same time, as these protracted Brexit discussions continue, we also see an opportunity for the university to send a strong signal to its staff as well as the wider community. We are asking you to affirm Cardiff University’s status as a world-leading institution with a commitment to attract and retain the best staff regardless of their national origins by supporting all staff from outside the UK with the cost of applications for work permits, indefinite leave to remain, settled status, and citizenship, which as the result of Brexit may be borne by an even larger number of staff than at present.
As a university our strength comes from our collegiality (indeed we really are in it together as we always have been), diversity, tolerance and openness. We believe, the time is right now to take a more visible, vocal, and pro-actively pro-European stance.
As a beacon of intellectual rigour, humanity, and the pursuit of truth, Cardiff University should call out the obvious untruths and mis-directions that surround the Brexit debate – untruths that many charged with governing this country have perpetuated.
More importantly, we feel that rather than accepting Brexit as an inevitability that will lead to strategic and financial pressures, Cardiff University should lead the way in Wales in fighting for people having an informed vote on the final deal.
We believe in doing so, Cardiff University can better reflect its commitment to our community, within Cardiff, Wales and the UK.
We look forward to hearing from you as soon as it is possible.