Lobby of Stirling University over redundancies

The protestors will assemble from 1 pm on the Cottrell lawn, outside the Court Building, Stirling University prior to the meeting which takes place at 2pm.

Stirling University announced voluntary severance scheme in June and its intention to lose 140 members of staff, which is nearly 10% of the workforce. The outcome of the voluntary severance scheme will be announced at the Court meeting and although the university is likely to be close to its 140 target, there are fears that it will still press ahead with compulsory redundancies, despite predictions of a surplus this year.

Mary Senior, UCU Scottish Official, said: 'Stirling University was quick to advertise the institution's recent recognition as 'Scottish University of the Year', as the most improved university in Scotland. However, it has been equally swift to reward the staff who achieved the accolade with severance. If it has any designs on retaining the award it needs to think again when it comes to sacking staff. The university has failed in its duty to negotiate in a meaningful and timely manner to avoid redundancies.

'Stirling University was clearly preparing for these cuts for some time and the proposed 10% cut in jobs is out of all proportion to the 1.6% funding cut. UCU believes that the university will be running at a surplus this year and next. However, instead of closing the severance scheme the university seems to be contemplating compulsory redundancies, which will be fiercely opposed by the unions.

'We will be outside the court meeting on Monday 19 October making clear our objection to any further redundancies and calling on the meeting to scrap any compulsory job losses.'

In March the Scottish Funding Council, SFC, announced changes in allocations arising from the latest assessment of research which resulted in Stirling receiving a 1.6% cut in recurrent funding mainly due to errors in judgement in its submission to the research assessment exercise.