UCU accuses Goldsmiths management of 'burning down its own house', calls for independent audit

UCU analysis of senior management's 'business case' shows Goldsmiths is not in financial crisis and that there is no pressing financial rationale for these redundancies. Goldsmiths has tens of millions in cash reserves and there is minimal risk, even in the event of student numbers falling short of projections, that it will fall foul of Office for Students requirements.  

The union is also clear that Goldsmiths' justifications for the mass jobs cull are deeply dishonest. In particular, Goldsmiths senior managers have repeatedly claimed - in an effort to present their expenditure on staff as unsustainable - that the sector average for staff costs as a proportion of total expenditure is 43%, despite the latest HESA data putting the figure at 51%.  

There are further concerns that the redundancy programme may have discriminated against staff with protected characteristics and that the process by which individual academics have been 'scored' is seriously flawed, leaving Goldsmiths open to legal challenges in the future.  

A UCU spokesperson said: 'Goldsmiths senior management are not only attacking jobs but doing so based on false premises and through the use of potentially discriminatory 'rank and yank' tactics. We need a full, independent audit of the institution's finances, as management refuse to open the books and be honest about their position.  

'These cuts will not only wreck the lives of many academics; they threaten the future of unique, world-leading programmes which are likely to be stripped of the specialist staff required to run them. This should prompt intervention from the Labour government.  

'It is despicable and perplexing that Goldsmiths is exploiting the generalised sense of crisis in the higher education sector to burn down its own house. We call on the institution's senior management to immediately halt its arsonist 'Transformation Programme' and work with us to protect jobs.'