On 3rd April all staff at Coventry University received an email discussing the financial situation at the university which we are led to believe is dire.

Our VC asked all staff for suggestions – so our members happily obliged. Have a read below for our members suggestions. We think they have some good ones!

In-Year Cost Savings Email to the Vice-Chancellor

Dear John

In your email on 03/04/20 you requested staff suggestions for in year cost savings.  UCU has always sought to ensure the university is sustainable, hence our focus on supporting staff and placing quality at the forefront, we welcome the opportunity to share our members’ thoughts.

“Working together, colleagues successfully rose to the challenge of finding the £10 million of in-year budget savings we needed prior to the pandemic. We now face new challenges and we must continue to work together if we are to meet them head on. As before, I am interested to hear suggestions from everyone across the group.” 

You have asked for in year savings so the university must share and openly explain all the financial risks and burdens it is carrying. Ultimately, it is your decisions which must be reviewed in order to understand the context and scale of the cost savings required.

Coventry UCU have collated the thoughts and views of our members in response,  which are articulated as follows:

The unprecedented global crisis we find ourselves in highlights the unsustainable nature of UKHEI and Coventry University’s approach to higher education – ‘The Coventry Way’. 

Coventry University is now at a crossroads which provides us an unique opportunity to reflect and refocus on what we want our university to be. We have a rare opportunity as Connell (2019:171) suggests to create a more “democratic, engaged, truthful, creative, and sustainable” university.  

We must restate that the core functions of Coventry University like all universities is teaching and research.  To this effect we believe education is not only about the transference of knowledge but about cognition and human flourishing too.  UCU Coventry believes the current approach and trajectory of Coventry University does not reflect these points and the University mission needs to be altered and become sustainable for a post-Covid world. 

For example, UCU refers to Durham University’s strategy to hastily move to online teaching which has recently been reversed.  Public condemnation from current students, alumni, staff and UCU have brought about this reversal. In the meantime, Coventry University continues to hastily expand its online offering when very few online courses generate significant revenues unless cross subsidised from traditional delivery courses.

The current University strategy is not fit for purpose and must be re-formulated to a sustainable and inclusive model. A video recently shared about the death of an NHS consultant shows young kids reflecting about life after lock down and how: 

“we can be better humans”. 

This may be a time for you to reflect on your position and consider this a time for change and fresh leadership. It is now time for you to genuinely listen and engage with all university communities beyond the ULT and senior management.  The university must establish its core values in line with its corporate social responsibility. This would include an ethical review of all UK and overseas investments. The university has to remember that it has charitable status.

Therefore, UCU are tabling the following suggestions for in-year cost savings as requested. The cost-savings have been developed which reflect a more coherent and structured approach to university operations. 

Key Cost Savings:

• Freeze on sourcing consultants and where necessary draw on existing skill base within the university. 
  • How much has the CU Group spent on external consultants over the last five years?

• 12 month recruitment freeze.

• Vice-Chancellor with immediate effect, to take a pay cut of at least 25% along with all other members of ULT.  

• Vice-Chancellor salary to be 1.5 times full professor salary.

• Remove all heads of department upwards and have them democratically elected by staff every 3-4 years.  
  • Salary is defined as 1.2 times top of Grade 9

• No more casualised staff.

• Source multiple competitive quotes for staff and student travel procurement.

• An embargo on business and first class flights for all staff members. 

• An open and transparent review of all current and pending licencing including Aula and Clear Review.  
  • How much does each cost and what is the business case for each?

• Review remote working policy and allow staff to spend at least one day a week, where possible, to work from home.

• Reestablish offices and move away from open plan offices and hot desking in order to mitigate against any future pandemics and re-establish university communities. 

• Allow staff to buy and sell extra holiday days.

Long Term Cost Saving:

Tying management pay to that of other staff will result in lower remuneration bills and better align the objectives of staff and management to each other. ‘This would improve staff morale, cultivate a shared vision and consequently lead to better mental health and wellbeing which could only improve staff morale and therefore productivity’.

• Senior leadership positions across the Group must be openly reviewed and streamlining of all levels of management must take place.
  • What added value do these positions bring to the core functions (teaching and research) of the university?  
  • Lord Patten raised the question of Coventry University’s top heavy management on 7th January 2020 in Parliament HL151.

Democratisation of University Structures:

Democratisation of university wide structures is proposed encompassing the following measures:

• Vice-Chancellor and the ULT to be elected democratically every 3-4 years.   

• Remove all heads of department upwards and have them democratically elected by staff every 3-4 years.  
  • Salary is defined as 1.2 times top of Grade 9

• Create a COVID-19 Hardship Fund in which 15% of the reduction in ULT and SLT’s wages goes into this fund to support staff on precarious contracts.     

• Reconstitute the Board of Governors with all board members to be democratically elected every three years and to be representative of the core functions of the university and the wider community.  

Property:

• Provide an open and transparent business case review of all university buildings.  Sell off or repurpose any unprofitable buildings, for example the Technocentre.

• Two year moratorium on all property purchases.

Regards

UCU Committee 

Source: Connell, R., 2019. The good university: what universities actually do and why it’s time for radical change.  London: Zed Books.