University of Sheffield strike ballot opens today over plan to put as many as 1,000 staff at risk of redundancy

The strike ballot is over plans from management to threaten as many as 1,000 staff with redundancy. It will close on Monday 31 March, and a successful result would pave the way for strike action as soon as April if management refuses to rule out compulsory redundancies.

The dispute is over management's goal of cutting £23m from its staffing budget over this academic year and the next. UCU estimates this equates to over 400 jobs. The union believes as many as 1,000 professional services staff are about to be threatened with redundancy in a restructure of every school within the university. On top of this, management is already restructuring the English language teaching centre, which placed 109 staff at risk of redundancy, and a dozen other academic and professional services teams in the university have been 'targeted' for staff reductions.

Management says it needs to make the cuts to return to a surplus within two years, yet the accounts show the university has very little debt, strong reserves, strong liquidity and an operational surplus. UCU believes the university could afford a more measured approach to its current financial situation, rather than reducing the number of staff to an extreme extent in such a short time frame.

UCU Sheffield branch president Robyn Orfitelli said: 'Since Koen Lamberts took up his post as vice-chancellor in 2018, he has introduced an unprecedented amount of disruptive and damaging restructures at the university, with at least 25 formal change management processes in a six year period, impacting hundreds of staff. However, that is nothing compared to the speed of change he is overseeing right now. In just one academic year, we estimate he is placing as many or more staff at risk of losing their jobs than in the entire rest of his tenure. That is unacceptable, and the leadership of this university needs to hold itself accountable for what it is doing to staff, students, and the future of this institution.'

UCU general secretary Jo Grady said: 'There are a number of options management could take instead of seeking to axe 400 jobs, but so far there has been no attempt to work with us to use the university's strong financial position to protect jobs or indeed to shift savings onto other areas.

'Our members will be voting yes in this strike ballot because they refuse to be the first in the line for any cuts and demand management rules out compulsory redundancies. We hope management begins to work with us so we can avoid any industrial unrest.'