[20
NOV 00] COVENTRY TECHNICAL COLLEGE NEWS
Lecturers Strike Over College Job Cuts
Lecturers
at Coventry Technical College are to go on strike this week in protest
at plans to cut of a third of the full time teaching positions.
Debts
of more than £2 million were uncovered at the college in May this
year, and the axe is to fall on up to 35 full-time posts to save
money.
Lecturers
are to set up picket lines outside the college in Butts, Earlsdon from
Wednesday until Friday to raise awareness of the issue.
They
are also hoping to persuade management to improve the voluntary
redundancy package on offer – which is currently the same as the
statutory minimum.
Geraldine
Egan, regional organiser of the National Association of Teachers in
Further and Higher Education (NATFHE) said senior staff were taking
the brunt of the cuts, but had been offered just £230 per year of
service – the statutory minimum.
She
said staff staying at the college were concerned that managers would
resort to similar radical action in the future if there were more
financial difficulties.
Ms
Egan said:
”The
way the restructuring is being done is from the top down. All the
senior staff, those who stayed with the college when it went bust in
the early 1990s are the ones who are being told to go.
”We
are looking for a better voluntary package so people can feel more
in control of what is happening.”
The
college’s difficulties have been compounded by a change in its
funding arrangements next year.
It
has to wrap up all its existing financial affairs by 31 March, when
responsibility passes from the Further Education Funding Council to
the Learning Skills Council.
Ms
Egan said this switch meant the college didn’t have any time to ride
out the problems, and has no overdraft to absorb the shortfall.
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