From the February issue of The Respect PaperMandelson puts boot into UnisTerry Smith
The recent announcement by Lord Mandelson of a fresh wave of cuts in University spending, adding up to almost £1 billion over the longer term, accompanied by the loss of 10,000 student places and draconian fines on Universities which recruit above their quota this year, amounts to a complete abandonment of the government's controversial pledge for 50% of school leavers to go to university.Teaching budgets are being slashed, with hundreds of teaching and other jobs already facing the axe in many universities, as ministers effectively give up on the notion of a skills-led recovery and opt for quicker, short-termist cutbacks.
According to the Lecturers' union UCU, the total number of academic jobs at risk or already lost in the universities is a staggering 4,797.
New universities have been hard hit -Bolton University is seeking a 10% cut in staffing costs - but some of the most dramatic cutbacks are at more traditional and well-established universities: Imperial College is axing 63 jobs in the Faculty of Medicine; King's College London is looking to cut staffing costs by 10% - equivalent of 390 or more jobs.
University College London is also cutting up to 400 jobs with a target of cutting the wage bill by £20 million. Leeds is cutting up to 187 jobs; Reading is closing its health care department; Sussex University is cutting £3m this year and £5m next ...
The long-term damage to the quality of teaching, at a time when universities have been press-ganged into accepting many more students with lower A level qualifications and in need of more teaching support, is clear.
But Mandelson has an even longer-term plan that would further undermine the academic content of many degree courses: he wants them cut to just two years instead of three, making them little more than training courses teaching 'skills' for industry.
While Vice Chancellors have been quick to speak out against Mandelson's cuts and emphasise the impact they will have on teaching budgets, there has been little actual response from the unions, and the Labour-dominated National Union of Students has mounted no significant protest.
But the impact of the latest cuts has been calculated as equivalent to a cut in resources of £190 per student, with universities losing 12.5 percent of their budget over the next three years. So no matter how Mandelson may try to spin the cuts and argue that they should be done in such a way as to minimise the impact on teaching and students, lasting blows are being inflicted, and these will not be reversed if the Tories should win the election.
Respect rejects this consensus for poor quality higher education. We must invest in our young people if we are to have a future. The bankers and their system have caused this problem: they must be made to pay to put it right.
| 
