Explanation of Voluntary Redundancy Letter

A number of staff who have volunteered for redundancy have been very concerned about the following statement which was included in the letter which management have handed out today, and have asked us what it means.

‘at this stage, your acceptance is only provisional.
The reason for this is that the University is unable to progress any applications at this stage because the ongoing Collective Consultation process with the Trade Unions and they have requested that we put the Voluntary Severance process on hold’

The University has a statutory duty to consult with the unions. This consultation period does not end until mid January. Unfortunately, the University decided to start implementing the redundancy programme the day after it started consultation. Unfortunately, the consultations have not proceeded easily. It has taken us weeks to get financial information from management which we thought should be readily available. As a result, our consultations have been delayed. But even more worrying, the financial information we have received from the University, together with our own calculations have given us serious concerns about the concept of Project Headroom and also its implementation. Our detailed written reply to the University will be made available to members shortly. But in short we have serious concerns that the business plans for the two Schools will leave both Schools financially weaker and will result in further redundancies next year.