Aber uni axing jobs and Arts Centre in financial embarrassment

The university’s accounts for 2014/15 shows the institution spent almost £2.5m on staff redundancies last year, while the Arts Centre posted losses close to £200,000 in 2015 alone.

When the uni’s accounts were released last week, the figures showed that the institution followed through with 90 redundancies in the past year alone, while still granting a hefty pay rise to the departing Vice-Chancellor, April McMahon.

In the academic year 2014/15, the university axed close to 100 jobs, leading to £2,488,000 which will be paid out in  severance packages.

This development raises the total spent on redundancies to over £5m in the last two academic years alone. Axing such substantial amounts of jobs is part of the university’s restructuring programme.

Whilst Aber uni employed 1,764 back in 2013/14, the number of staff now dropped to 1,654 following the deep-reaching restructuring measures and cuts.

The redundancies measures however did not affect McMahon’s hefty pay rise of £5,000 which the university granted the departing Vice-Chancellor back in 2014/15 – against vast criticism from the public and staff/student body. The Vice-Chancellor increased her salary from £219,000 to £223,000 in 2015 before her departure in July.

Moreover, the report reveals that the Arts Centre – cultural heart and soul of Penglais Campus – posted £200,000 losses in the bygone year. The arts programmes and trading sales are to blame for the majority of the losses, now culminating to an overall £1.2m over the last decade. The report also illustrates that the Arts Centre’s income has declined by £500,000 since 2013/14.

The report clearly indicates the imperative to ensure the sustainability of the institution through recruiting more students onto their programmes, since tuition fees now make up close to half of the university’s income.