Union victory in funding fight

At an assembly government economic summit to help co-ordinate efforts to tackle the recession, ministers announced funding for an additional 2,500 full-time further education places. The announcement comes less than week after UCU led a 300-strong demonstration and lobby of the assembly government in Cardiff Bay in protest at funding cuts and potential jobs losses in the further education sector in Wales.
 
Precise details of how the funding will be allocated to colleges in Wales are expected later this month.
 
UCU general secretary, Sally Hunt, said: 'Today's announcement represents a victory for the campaigning and the hard work of UCU members and the other trade unions in the sector. We now need to see full details of how the funding will be allocated.
 
'Today's announcement is only part of the picture. We fully expect colleges going through the process of redundancy to seriously consider their options. The middle of a recession is not the time to be making highly trained, qualified educators redundant when the Welsh economy needs them more than ever.'