Newsletter No.1 

Dear colleague

Cutbacks are being made at RGU following a reported £11.1 million recurrent deficit for the 2023/24 academic year.

RGU are seeking to reach a £18 million savings target with £10.5 million in staff savings.

These figures are published by RGU and we cannot state as to whether they are accurate or the extent of RGU’s current reserves or RGU’s 2024-25 spending plans.

The university is seeking to make deeper cuts than those which are needed to get back on track.

These cuts are being made on the back of our members and at the cost of the quality of education and community presence of RGU.

A flawed business case was presented to the union and schools as a way forward for the university to get out of the financial deficit.

This business case, which compared RGU to universities across Scotland and the UK which were by no means comparable with the experience and place within the community and Scottish education that RGU is known for, was presented as a way out of a deficit.

Staff across the university have taken voluntary severance.

Our members have gone through round after round of consultation meetings.

Yet still more cuts are threatened

Cuts which will leave lasting damage and threaten the nature of education at RGU and our members working conditions.

We have seen members of staff who have built significant business links, bringing in funding from outside of the university, promoting the university in the wider community and business as well as building future career opportunities for students moved on or moving on through the VS scheme.

The loss of the funding from these business links as well as the status in the wider community will not lead to financial stability for the future of the university.

In the last student satisfaction survey, the student experience in computing was deemed the best in the UK. That same school has now had members of staff threatened with redundancy and leaving.

The deficit is due to numerous varying factors, none of which are of the making of our members in RGU.

Voluntary severance uptake has eased some of the financial strains on RGU, but a strong possibility exists that other staff may be at risk of compulsory redundancy in the months to come as and when the new school structure comes into being.

How much more must the university cut from its most important resource to satisfy a management who started this process on the already shaky foundations of their business case?

The cuts to international students have affected universities across the UK.

Not every university has decided to gamble the way out of those cuts by damaging the very people who deliver the education today and in the future of the university.

We have been clear in this.

If the university is to take a sustainable way out of the current financial situation that it finds itself in, it has to have an educational offer that students, from wherever they may be, will want to take up.

In the last ten years the university has run a surplus in two of those years, namely 2021/22 and 2022/23

The university already gambled by balancing significant staffing undertakings and investment on these surpluses and international student fees, which could have been seen to be under threat for over a decade.

The university management must not gamble its future financial stability on cuts to education.

Short term cuts do not lead to long term financial stability.

The EIS-ULA is clear that compulsory redundancy is unacceptable in any situation; and further opposes voluntary redundancies where additional work and stress is placed on remaining staff who are left to carry the workload burden which does not disappear when staff numbers diminish.

You are being asked one question in this consultative ballot:

Are you willing to take industrial action consisting of Strike Action in pursuit of the RGU Cuts Dispute?

If members support strike action in this ballot, then the EIS will move to a statutory ballot in pursuit of the dispute against the planned cuts. Any industrial action could only commence following an industrial action mandate obtained by a statutory ballot.

The EIS urges our members in RGU vote YES on this consultative ballot to demonstrate your willingness to stand together as a membership and academic community. Other disputes have demonstrated that many employers only make concessions when they are compelled to. Industrial action is required to facilitate that outcome.

The EIS stands ready to meet with RGU management at any time, should it wish to avoid industrial action and resolve this dispute.

If you have not used your vote yet then you can do so straight away. All this requires is the link and codes sent to you (Angela can fill in when this was sent).

If you have not received the email with your ballot link and codes then let us know straight away by emailing ballot@eis.org.uk and we will send you the relevant information.