Festive redundancies in UK Higher Education

A list of UK universities that are making staff redundant, or have announced redundancy plans, from Christmas 2018 into 2019

In alphabetical order and last updated 14 August 2019, 12:00 GMT

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• Abertay University (Source: The Courier, 22 May 2019; ‘the university intends to cut 20 jobs’)
• Anglia Ruskin University (Source: Cambridge News, 1 August 2019)
• Bangor University (Sources: The Bangor Aye, 13 December 2018; Seren, 18 December 2018 on proposed cuts; Wales Online, 17 January 2019)
• Bath Spa University (Source: private correspondence, 16 June 2019. Would appreciate further corroboration)
• Birkbeck, University of London (Sources: The Guardian, 11 December 2018; The i, 9 November 2018)
• Bournemouth University (Source: private correspondence, 9 May 2019. Would appreciate further corroboration)
• University of Bristol (‘No VS scheme currently in operation’. Source: Bristol UCU Twitter, 5 March 2019; however private correspondence, 26 March 2019, suggests that there is ‘mutually agreed resignation’ scheme)
• University of Brighton (Source: private correspondence, 6 May 2019. Would appreciate further corroboration)
• Cardiff University (Source: BBC News, 3 December 2018)
• University of Central Lancashire (Source: Blog Preston, 23 June 2019; Lancashire Post, 7 August 2019)
• Durham University — College Staff and Departmental Administrative Staff (Source: Palatinate, 19 March 2019; The Northern Echo, 29 March 2019; Palatinate, 25 April 2019)
• Edge Hill University (Source: UCU at EHU Twitter, 7 May 2019)
• University of Exeter (Source: Exeter UCU Twitter, 21 January 2019)
• University of Gloucestershire (Source: BBC News, 4 December 2018; Gloucestershire Live, 6 February 2019)
• University of Hertfordshire (Source: UCU Hertfordshire Twitter, 25 June 2019; ‘Intention to cut History by 25% this summer’)
• University of Hull (Source: private correspondence, 12 May 2019. Would appreciate further corroboration)
• Keele University (Source: Keele UCU Twitter, 28 February 2019; Stoke on Trent Live, 14 March 2019; Keele UCU Twitter, 26 June 2019)
• University of Kent (Source: Kent Online, 21 December 2018; Twitter, 7 February 2019; Kent Online, 7 February 2019)
• Lancaster University — Library (Source: Lancaster UCU Twitter, 9 May 2019)
• Leeds Trinity University (Source: private correspondence, 3 March 2019. Voluntary and compulsory redundancies since last academic year and ongoing. Further corrobation on Twitter, 4 March 2019)
• Nottingham Trent University (Source: Nottinghamshire Live, 28 May 2019; ‘UNISON, one of the UK’s largest trade unions, is also considering whether staff wanted to launch a formal industrial action vote over Nottingham Trent University, after it claims a restructuring process could put 134 jobs at risk. The university will be creating a new communications, admissions and student recruitment department, and the union says existing staff members will have to reapply for their jobs, leading to further uncertainty.’)
• University of Northampton (Source: Northamptonshire Telegraph, 5 August 2019; ‘The University of Northampton is making more than a dozen staff redundant at the same time as taking on a new deputy vice-principal.’)
• Queen Margaret University (Source: UCU, 11 December 2018; BBC News, 16 January 2019)
• University of Plymouth (Source: Plymouth Herald, 5 October 2018; ITV News, 2 April 2019; Plymouth Herald, 3 April 2019)
• University of Portsmouth (Source: The News (Portsmouth), 24 May 2019; ‘The university has confirmed that up to 65 people could be affected by redundancies in the Faculty of Science, as the department is restructured.’)
• University of Reading (Source: The Guardian, 11 December 2018; Times Higher Education, 8 March 2019: ‘university announces plans to cut roughly a third of modern languages jobs’)
• Royal Holloway, University of London (Source: Royal Holloway website, 6 February 2019)
• Sheffield Hallam University (Source: Sheffield Telegraph, 13 December 2018)
• SOAS, University of London Library (Source: Change.org, 10 December 2018)
• University of Surrey (Source: The Independent, 27 February 2019; Surrey UCU, 1 May 2019)
• University College London (Source: UCL UCU Twitter, 12 December 2018)
• University of Wales Trinity St David (Possible source: Times Higher Education, 29 January 2019: ‘University of Wales Trinity St David said last week that it aimed to save £8.5 million a year by cutting staff costs to 55% of revenue, down from 70%’; BBC News, 14 June 2019: ‘It confirmed it was looking at 110 possible job cuts and had nearly completed a process to save £6.5m’; Wales Online, 14 June 2019: ‘the university was taking forward 170 redundancies in total, of which just 70 were voluntary […] Now the university has confirmed it has accepted 94 applications for voluntary redundancy, and has made a further 16 members of staff compulsorily redundant’)
• University of Winchester (Source: Times Higher Education, 8 March 2019; Southern Daily Echo, 15 March 2019; UCU, 10 May 2019)
• University of Wolverhampton (Source: Express & Star, 20 June 2018; still ongoing/unresolved)

‘Teach Out’ and closures

A ‘teach out’ is when a university has decided to phase out a course that still has students enrolled. No new students will be taken, the relevant department is under the threat of closure, and university staff can be made redundant.

• Bangor University. Bangor University confirmed the closure of its Chemistry Department (Source: BBC News, 10 April 2019)
• Coventry University. Centre for Advances in Behavioural Science and the ‘Centre for Innovative Research Across the Life Course (Source: Coventry UCU Twitter, 23 February 2019: ‘STOP PRESS: #Coventry #University have just announced the closure of the “Centre for Advances in Behavioural Science” and the “Centre for Innovative Research Across the Life Course”. 53 staff are at risk of redundancy. These centres were only opened in 2017! Disgraceful.’; Coventry Telegraph, 27 February 2019)
• University of Hull. Philosophy and Modern Languages and Cultures departments (Source: Hull Daily Mail, 11 December 2018; ‘confirmed that new students may not be taken onto philosophy or modern languages courses during the 2019–2020 academic year’). Restructuring of Learning and Teaching Enhancement Unit with potential redundancies; suspension of Youth Work and Community Development programme (Source: private correspondence, 24 December 2018. Would appreciate further corroboration)
• Middlesex University. Centre for Psychoanalysis (Source: PHILOS-L Listserv, 15 June 2019; ‘Middlesex University has decided to close the Centre for Psychoanalysis and has issued redundancy letters to its current academics’)
• University of Sussex. Pharmacy department (Source: University of Sussex, 14 December 2018; ‘The University of Sussex has decided to stop accepting new Pharmacy students from 2019’)