Stop the cuts!.

Hau Taki Haere | Tertiary Update Vol 27, No 7

Te Hautū Kahurangi | Tertiary Education Union will continue to fight for the future of the tertiary education sector as warning bells sound that the massive cuts signalled by Te Pūkenga and University of Otago may only be the beginning.

Last week, Universities New Zealand executive director Chris Whelan told RNZ Checkpoint “This has been something that’s been happening across the university sector, really, for the last three or four years. Partly COVID, but also partly long-term government funding settings.”

“All of them are dealing with challenges around making their books balance. It’s certainly worse in some universities than others. Eight universities around New Zealand – five have seen a drop in student numbers this year, all are still rebuilding their international student pipelines, and all of this is on the back of what’s been a long-term decline in funding per student from the government.”

TEU’s Te Pou Ahurei | National Secretary Sandra Grey says “the worst part about this is there’s nothing new here. We have been campaigning on a national scale to defend our tertiary education sector from death by a thousand cuts for many years. But clearly we need to shout even louder.”

“If you listen to the Vice Chancellors, Te Pūkenga management, and/or Universities New Zealand, you would think this is all inevitable, that their hands are tied and making good people redundant is the only way to go. This is rubbish. Management have other choices. One of them is to work with us to secure more funding, which they have steadfastly refused to do.”

“We do not plan to sit back and let this happen. We will be meeting with a group of branch presidents this week to discuss a coordinated national approach to fight the cuts. And we urge anyone in the sector who is not yet a member of the TEU to join us now and be part of the solution.”

Also in this update:

Other stories

“Several hundred” jobs on the line at University of Otago – TEU

Wellington's Victoria University not ruling out redundancies as enrolments fall – Stuff

$60m hole at uni, hundreds of jobs set to go – ODT

Academic board 'unequivocally' opposed to Massey University restructure – Stuff