As unions consider strike action to oppose job cuts at Glasgow Caledonian, the university’s principal has said that cuts have only been proposed in areas impacted by a drop in international student numbers and tuition.
In an effort to close a predicted £10 million deficit, following net losses of £33 million over the past two years, Glasgow Caledonian University (GCU) launched a voluntary redundancy scheme, which ended earlier in April.
Management is currently reviewing the results of the initial consultation and the alternative savings proposals put forward by union representatives, who have pointed to the university's reserves and questioned whether all savings options had been considered before resorting to staff cuts.
Speaking exclusively to The Herald, Professor Mairi Watson said the decline in international student numbers was a shock to the university and that the financial losses were the central driver of the roles included in the original savings proposals.
From a high point in 2022/23 to this year, GCU officials say the university has seen a decline of over 3,000 international students. In some postgraduate programmes, university sources have said enrolment dropped from around 800 international students to as few as eight. At least some of that decline was by design, resulting from a UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI) action plan implemented at the end of the last academic year, which required the university to take a more conservative approach to recruitment.
The impact of this decline, Prof Watson said, extended well beyond teaching staff: support roles built around serving those students specifically, and areas of the university's wider structure that had been cross-subsidised directly by international tuition income, were also affected.
"We have to reduce the workforce to respond to that," she said. "It would be very difficult to say to our governing body that, even though there is less activity, I'd like to keep these people. I would like to, for their own well-being and financial health, but I can't."
When asked why job cuts were proposed in the first instance, she said that it was prudent for the university to consider posts directly dependent on international recruitment.
For many positions that were either directly responsible for international students or supported by the international students’ tuition, "the work is not there,” Prof Watson said, adding that the initial savings proposal targeted areas where the need had fallen.
"What I don't like to see is universities cutting jobs, but the work doesn't change. That's not fair to staff."
As blunt as the assessment may be, Prof Watson said that the university is a vital resource for Scotland and the Glasgow community. It is the largest recruiter of graduate apprentices in Scotland, with over 1,100 students currently enrolled; enrolment trends show that it serves a substantial number of students who come either from Glasgow City or from Scotland’s most deprived postcodes, and was recently recognised as the top university in Scotland for students in employment or further study within 15 months of graduating.
Although her job is to ensure the university can sustain itself, Prof Watson acknowledged the impact that any job cuts would have on individuals, she said.
"The end goal has to be the future sustainability of the university, because of the responsibilities that we have. And I can only do that if I'm making difficult decisions. The only times you can make redundancies are when the work is reducing or has gone away. That is when you need to reshape the workforce.
"Every time that comes out of my mouth, I am seeing faces. I'm seeing the people that I sat in front of. I've spoken to every single person who's at risk in the organisation at the moment. I'm seeing their faces, and I'm hearing their questions, and I'm saying I'm sorry, but your work is no longer there, and so I have to remove the posts that deliver that work."
The current review of the initial redundancy consultation and staff alternatives is still ongoing, but Prof Watson said the scale of the international income decline left the university with little choice but to begin identifying savings.
"I want us to build a resilient organisation so that when shocks happen, we're either ready, because we saw it coming, or we're resilient — and that's the only way that we can survive.
Earlier this month, a joint demonstration was organised by members of multiple teaching and support staff unions opposing planned job cuts. Then, this week, the GCU branch of The Educational Institute of Scotland - University Lecturers' Association (EIS-ULA) announced it would open a strike ballot.
Unions have pushed against the need for GCU to resort to job cuts, arguing that the university holds £90m in reserves which could be used to prevent or delay job losses.
On this point, Prof Watson said that the university's reserves are an important resource that must be managed carefully.
"Universities are measured on something called net liquidity days, that's the number of days you would survive if all of your income stopped. Ultimately, that's what the reserves are for: enough net liquidity days to get through a massive shock. At the moment, the sector standard is three to six months, and we are around that.
"So, if you look at it from that direction, it's not a lot of money. We live in a world where something like that could happen tomorrow, right? I need to support my staff through that, and support our students through whatever that is, and that money would be gone in six months."
In addition to serving as a de facto emergency fund, Prof Watson said the reserves are essential to cover high ongoing costs, including maintenance and updates to the university's IT infrastructure.
"I need those reserves for the long-term sustainability of the university. I need to invest in the campus. I need to invest in my staff. I will spend some of them as we go through the redundancy process, to make sure that the impact is lessened on as many staff as possible and so we can do the process at the appropriate pace."
Karen Lorimer, GCU UCU branch president, questioned the university’s strategy of moving directly to propose job cuts a few weeks into a new principal’s tenure.
"GCU is one of the most financially secure in Scotland, with very substantial cash reserves. These are not abstract accounting figures. They exist precisely to help institutions navigate uncertainty and avoid short-term decisions that cause long-term damage.
"You don't protect the future of a university by cutting the people who make it work. Reserves are there for rainy days. This is exactly that kind of moment.
"Universities routinely manage fluctuations in recruitment without immediately cutting staff. Our members have engaged constructively and put forward detailed, credible alternatives that would protect both jobs and academic provision.
"UCU remains committed to working with management to find solutions that protect the university's long-term sustainability and the people who are central to its success."
Dr Nick McKerrell, GCU branch secretary of the EIS-ULA, said that "exceptionally high" international recruitment in previous years had helped the university "amass cash reserves which are amongst the highest in Scotland."
He questioned whether the link to falling international recruitment is strong enough to justify the savings proposals.
“Even given the broader HE crisis about international recruitment, the decision to cut 100 jobs makes no sense. The targeted areas and staff have only a tenuous link to this recruitment. It seems so random that staff from every corner of the Uni believe they could be next in line for redundancy – it is one of the reasons that support for the campaign against the cuts is so widespread.
“Discussions about the future of the University should be held between unions and management but without the threat of redundancies hanging over us all.
