London Metropolitan University - petition

Please note the two petitions (see below, linked here and here), have been consolidated into the following petition. Please sign the new petition below.

Petition text:

'We the undersigned, note that the future of London Metropolitan University is now under threat arising from the reduction in their teaching grant by £18m / year and claw back £38m in over-payments as a result of inaccurate returns on student completion rates. We reject the management's response to this crisis of insisting on a minimum of 330 redundancies across the university within months. Reductions in staffing will erode the institution's ability to offer high quality education to Londoners and will inflict damage on the prospects of the students who pursue their studies, often at great cost. In a recession, we should be investing more, not less, in education.

'We call upon the management to reverse its current cuts policy and commit themselves to:

• no redundancies
• no deterioration of terms and conditions or workloads
• no victimisation of union members
• meaningful consultation with staff unions over alternative cost savings as a matter of urgency
• setting up with immediate effect departmental working groups with full staff and union involvement to conduct thorough analysis of potential non-staff related cost savings
• if management wish to run a voluntary severance scheme, it should only go ahead after thorough and meaningful consultation and be fully funded and run in a transparent and equitable fashion.

'We call upon the government to:

• intervene with HEFCE to secure London Metropolitan's funding, governance and future.

'Finally, we believe that the crisis within this university can only be solved through serious engagement with the staff unions by the management rather than seeking to bypass or even penalise UCU and Unison representatives. We therefore call upon the vice-chancellor, management and governors of the university to:

• abandon the contemplated large-scale redundancies that, if implemented, will place in serious jeopardy both the education of current students and the existence of the institution
• work with the recognised trade unions in facing the current crisis
• withdraw threatened proceedings against trade union reps.'

Sign the Petition, go to:

https://www.ucu.org.uk/index.cfm?articleid=3678