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VU cuts go deeper
Hundreds more jobs are set to go; NTEU says some will be involuntary. By Dallas Bastian
Forced retrenchments will be part of the staff slashes at Victoria University, the National Tertiary Education Union has said.
The university has announced that it will cut 300 jobs – 200 professional staff and 100 academic staff – prompting the institution’ s NTEU branch president, Paul Adams, to argue that too many cuts have already been made.
“ The university has already been cut to the bone; we had 400 retrenchments last year,” he said.“ We can’ t see at the moment where the professional staff are going to come from without affecting the university in a serious way in terms of the way it functions.”
In addition, VU had previously announced that staff cuts would follow natural attrition and early retirement, with forced redundancies a last resort for the cash-strapped university. However, the NTEU says the cuts in the works go deeper.
“ It’ s been made clear to us and we’ ve already experienced in some of the changed plans we’ ve received that they will move to forced retrenchments as well,” Adams said.“ We are wondering why it’ s necessary to use such forceful means to get staff out the door.”
University vice-chancellor professor Peter Dawkins said the 300 positions would be dropped in an effort to ensure the university has a sustainable future and can head in the direction set out in its Phase 2 reforms, which also include steps to position the institution as Australia’ s sport university.
As for how the university would decide where to cut, Dawkins said,“ There is activity the university undertakes that is not critical to supporting the core work … in the strategic directions that our council has endorsed. We will look to move out of such activities.”
To achieve its goals, VU needs to find $ 40 million –$ 50 million of recurrent savings by 2016.
“ Without decisive action to streamline our operations and cut costs, our cost pressures will race ahead of revenue growth,”
Dawkins said.“ We will aim to achieve a sustainable future by a simplification agenda – streamlining operations, minimising red tape and reducing staff numbers.”
The university has suffered from both federal and state funding cuts, and roughly $ 25 million was stripped from the state’ s TAFEs. In addition to this, the institution has not had good results under the uncapped system. Moving into 2014, VU’ s commencing load was down.
The university has already streamlined its professional staff areas, including admissions, marketing and recruitment. Adams said,“ We are concerned that process may have damaged the ability of the university to recruit students.” The group is asking the university to conduct a full investigation before there are any further job losses. The NTEU has also started a public campaign calling for more funding.
Paul Abela, executive director of the Association for Tertiary Education Management, said it’ s obvious that VU has thought hard about what to do to make the university sustainable. However, he added that corporate knowledge and excellent management skills needed in tough economic times will be lost.
“ Often good management may not be in the cutting of jobs,” he said.“ We would like to think that good managers are retained by the university to ensure continuity and to be part of the solution.”
On top of this, Abela warns that academics may be forced to fill the administrative void, which will inevitably lead to complaints from staff that they are unable to do what they are paid for, which is research and teaching.
“ History has shown that once the economic situation improves, professional staff will be re-hired, so it is sound management practice to ensure there is a seamless transition,” Abela added.“ Sound management practice is very important in making sure that the university meets its goals and we trust that the advice of professional managers is heeded by the leadership in any plans to cut jobs.” ■
6 | campusreview. com. au