At an Extraordinary General Meeting on 18 August, members of Bangor UCU passed a Motion of No Confidence in the Bangor University Vice-Chancellor Edmund Burke and Chief Financial Officer Martyn Riddleston. The vote was overwhelming with no opposition to the motion, highlighting the anger of ordinary staff and lack of faith in the leadership of the north Wales institution of higher education.

The branch leadership delayed the publication of this vote with the aim of reaching a negotiated settlement with management, but the University management have decided to plough ahead with their cuts strategy.

In February, Bangor University, in Gwynedd, announced it would need to make savings of £15m that could result in about 200 job losses.

In a statement, Bangor University said it has had to “take difficult steps” to ensure “the future of the university”, blaming the drop in international students, a rise in costs and the UK government’s changes to national insurance had left them needing to make “unprecedented” changes.

Bangor UCU Vice-President Vivek Thuppil said: “Our members have been pushed to breaking point. With the departure of hundreds of staff already, they are already facing impossible workloads. With only two weeks to go until classes begin, departments still do not have clarity on who is teaching what. Rather than work with staff to find a sustainable path forward, this Vice-Chancellor and this CFO have chosen to double down on the same failed strategy of cuts that they pushed through at Leicester University”

Leicester UCU Co-Chair Joseph Choonara said: “It is very dispiriting to see Edmund Burke and Martyn Riddleston have learnt little from their time as senior managers at the University of Leicester. The 2021 ‘Shaping for Excellence’ redundancy programme, driven by Burke and others, not only caused demoralisation and led to several redundancies that were later found to be unlawful, it was a failure in its own terms. Four years on, we’re facing the prospect of further redundancies, addressing the kind of issues Burke claimed he would fix. That’s why members at Leicester have voted for extensive strike action. I would encourage those at Bangor to fight long and hard to save every job.”

Lack of confidence was evident at the EGM where members expressed scepticism that the leadership of the university had any plan to actually turn the situation around, given their lack of imagination in coming up with solutions to achieve the current financial savings.

One staff member said, “Senior management have not been forthcoming about their financial plans moving forward, beyond some unspecified comments about pursuing growth. [The projected earnings] for the new business school seem surprisingly positive, at a time when many business schools, including our own, have been cutting staff. The medical school receives government subsidy, but it is unclear when that subsidy ends and the implication of that [for the University]”.

At the EGM, Bangor UCU members also expressed indignation that a financial lifeline of nearly £1.4 million given to the University by the Welsh Government earlier this year had not been spent in a way that would protect jobs.

Bangor UCU Vice-President Vivek Thuppil said: “After persistent questioning, the CFO Martyn Riddleston finally admitted that the funding meant to provide breathing space to universities was spent on the medical school. As he has subsequently refused to answer a question about whether it replaced planned essential spend, which could then have been diverted to protect jobs, we must assume that it did not. Whilst management claim that the tertiary education regulator Medr did not convey any government intent behind this funding to save jobs, it nonetheless represents a disqualifying lapse in judgement on the part of the university leadership to spend these additional taxpayer funds on unplanned infrastructure at the same time as moving to make staff compulsorily redundant.”

There were also questions about fairness. From the university’s annual report, 13 members of the university executive drew a salary of £2.8 million. Despite repeated requests from the trade unions and the wider membership, the executive did not offer even a token sacrifice of their benefits to address the claimed financial crisis.

One staff member said, “Frankly, at this point, it is unclear what value the VC specifically, and the upper management in general, actually bring to our institution”.

The motion criticised the Vice-Chancellor and Chief Financial Officer for not understanding the Welsh educational landscape and for undermining historically constructive industrial relations at Bangor University. One staff member said, “Historically, we had a partnership between management and union, this has now been turned on its head”.

As part of an escalating strategy, Bangor UCU are now preparing a formal industrial action ballot, promising disruption at the university during the autumn semester. The threat of industrial action will remain unless the university management issue a guarantee of no compulsory redundancies for the 2025-26 academic year and rescind any compulsory redundancy notices that might have already been issued.