A London university hit by staff walkouts today admitted the sector is having a “painful time” as universities across the country face financial challenges.
Staff at Goldsmiths, University of London, will go on strike for a week after the summer in a long-running dispute over redundancies.
It comes as fears are growing that universities will have to cut courses, shut departments and reduce jobs as they struggle to cope with a financial crisis.
A spokeswoman for Goldsmiths said: “Universities across the UK are having to make difficult decisions to navigate unprecedented financial challenges.
“This is a painful time for us all as we take steps to make our finances sustainable.”
Goldsmiths staff who belong to the University and College Union will strike in September. The union is demanding the university halts all compulsory redundancies so that an improved voluntary severance scheme can be explored.
Staff at the university are already currently taking part in a marking and assessment boycott which is causing significant disruption to graduations. They recently took ten days of strike action which ended in June.
Around 100 staff are at risk of losing their jobs. The university had tried to close its Black British Literature course as part of the cuts, but after a backlash the decision was reversed.
A spokeswoman for the university added: “It's regrettable that our students are facing renewed industrial action, and we will ensure that their learning is supported.
“We consulted staff and unions over our plans but unfortunately this did not result in viable ways forward which would have avoided the need to make compulsory redundancies, which are currently at a provisional stage.”
She added: “Our plans will ensure that Goldsmiths continues to be a beacon for innovative research and teaching as well as an entry point for students, many of whom are the first in their family to go to university.”
The government is being urged to introduce an emergency rescue package for universities to prevent bankruptcies.
The Office for Students, a regulator which ensures students get value for money, has forecast that 40 per cent of England’s universities will run budget deficits this year and warned of closures and mergers. The UCU has drawn up a list of 66 universities, including Goldsmiths, that have faced financial difficulties over the past year. This is more than a third of Britain’s total number of universities.
Speaking on BBC’s Today Programme on Monday, education secretary Bridget Phillipson did not rule out an increase in tuition fees and said international students, who pay higher fees, are welcome. A recent cap on visas for overseas students has hit numbers, which has added to the financial problems of universities.
Ms Phillipson said: “What we had under the Conservatives was a fascination and a fixation on picking fights with the sector, completely needless. Just using universities as a source of cheap headlines - that is now at an end.”
Ms Phillipson also said the government will "consider" removing the two-child benefit cap "as one of a number of ways" of lifting children out of poverty.
She told Sky News: "Unfortunately it's also a very expensive measure, but we will need to consider it as one of a number of levers in terms of how we make sure we lift children out of poverty.
"Housing is a big factor... The fact that for lots of families work doesn't pay in the way that it should, and that increasingly what we see is that children are growing up in poverty where there is at least one person in that household in work.
"We will look at every measure in terms of how we can address this terrible blight that scars the life chances of too many children."
