Management tells staff a $25m cut must come

Vice Chancellor Eeva Leinonen says management has already made $30m in savings this year but needs to find $25m more next.

As to the case for cuts; Professor Leinonen does not attribute it solely to COVID-19 causes, warning, “staff salaries alone now represent 62 per cent of our cost base. This cannot be sustained.”

“Accordingly, we have invited the National Tertiary Education Union to commence discussions,” she adds. Professor Leinonen does not say about what, but asking the union into the tent suggests management is looking for an agreement on a plan.

This could include, a freeze on enterprise agreement pay-rises, with an accompanying guarantee to protect a specific number of FTE positions. But this would not reduce the staff establishment – the only way to do that is redundancies, voluntary or not.