Cardiff University risks falling into a "spiral of decline" owing to the way it announced sweeping proposed cuts, leading academics have warned. In their official response the academics from across departments say that the university executive board's approach "has seriously damaged" its reputation.

Former education minister Professor Leighton Andrews, who works in the university's business school and is one of hundreds of academics told their jobs are now at risk, edited the response paper, which has been seen by WalesOnline. The response has been submitted through the formal university consultation process but the academics who wrote it asked to remain anonymous.

In their document they say action to address the university's £31m-plus deficit should have been taken sooner and slower by those in charge to save jobs and reputation. Delays and the manner in which the proposed cuts were announced in January risks the standing of Wales' only Russell Group university. You can read the latest on the cuts and how 1,000 Cardiff University staff have been warned their jobs are still at risk here.

"Sadly the pain will not just be felt in the short-term. It is likely to have a medium- and long-term impact on Cardiff University’s reputation," the academics warn. Their response to the financial cuts planned will be followed by their own alternative plan which they said will be published separately soon.

"Reputations take decades to establish but they can be destroyed very quickly. The university executive board's approach on and since January 28 (when proposed cuts were announced) has seriously damaged Cardiff University’s reputation. "It is likely that these proposals will send the university – Wales’s only Russell Group university - into a spiral of decline."

The university has faced strong opposition to the shock proposed cuts in the face of its projected deficit. As well as the loss of 400 jobs, now slightly revised down to 355, the university proposes to the closure of entire degree courses and academic schools including nursing, modern languages, music, ancient history, translation, religion, and theology.

In their response the academics agreed savings are needed but said the timescale by the end of this academic year is too fast, was communicated badly, and could be mitigated by using some of the institution's vast reserves. Using reserves has been suggested by others, including the Welsh higher education minister, but ruled out by the university and its vice-chancellor Professor Wendy Larner.

The response concedes that the university "needs to take action to tackle its operating deficit" but points out that it has significant reserves, a strong balance sheet, low-cost long-term debt, and "a valuable revolving cash facility with its bank". The academics quote the vice-chancellor saying on February 1, 2024: ‘We have cash reserves and investments of £427m as at the end of July 2023. There is no reason for anyone to panic about our sustainability short-term."

And they went on to claim it appears Cardiff has a larger financial reserve than almost all the other Russell Group universities. They take reserves as meaning the "liquid cash and investments" set out as totalling £426m on page 25 of the most recent Cardiff University annual report, which was published at the end of January.

The academics' response states: "This total is divided into named types of holding. We understand that of these holdings (1) the £53m in ‘endowments’ cannot be accessed by the university and (2) the £7m in ‘approved capital projects’, £19m in ‘capital commitments’, and the £62m in ‘bond repayment’ may be at least partially accessible but that it would not be prudent to do so.

"This leaves £41m in ‘freely available to spend’, £144m in ‘bond funds’, and £100m in ‘long-term reserves’. These three sums add up to £285m. There do not appear to be any legal reasons preventing the university from accessing these funds. "

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On departments pulling their weight the academics add that there is "nothing wrong" with asking individual academic schools to contribute to the university's targets overall or to the target student/staff ratios. But doing this as fast as proposed risked Cardiff falling in the National Student Survey scores, they claimed.

And they said the university should have acted sooner to deliver savings in a more sustainable way when it realised the scale of financial woes. The document adds: "We are dismayed that the university did not act sooner, alongside its schools, to co-create a solution that could have fostered change at a gentler pace and produced savings earlier."

The academics disagreed with the vice-chancellor's conclusion that acting sooner would simply have meant the same decisions being taken a year earlier. " They could have been qualitatively different," the document states.

"The university has been recording an unplanned operating deficit since 2022-23. Yet a recruitment and promotion freeze did not commence mid-2024. This has made politicians, the media, staff, unions, and other stakeholders question why the university council did not enforce earlier and more measured interventions to address the mounting deficit which could have avoided the threat of compulsory redundancies."

And they add while the university claims to be risk-averse the way the whole matter has been handled has, they say, created huge risk. This could affect application numbers as well as staff and students leaving, other critics have pointed out.

Risks include publishing the cuts proposals the day before the Ucas deadline for undergraduate applications.. Adverse political response has included the higher education minister saying she expects universities to use their reserves to mitigate financial difficulties, the Senedd education committee summoning the vice-chancellor to appear, and Cardiff MPs publicly voicing concern.

"The UCU is balloting its members on industrial action and there have been frequent national and international media items about Cardiff University," the academics add. "The university has had significant adverse publicity and lost the trust of what it calls ‘the Welsh and UK political establishment’.

"The risk to the university in respect of its reputation is now unarguable and well-documented. This was unnecessary and is regrettable but it has happened and will be seriously damaging to the university in the medium-term. "

The document doesn't add high-profile figures and organisations who have publicly opposed the cuts. These include former Labour leader Neil Kinnock, the Royal College of Nursing, and Dame Kiri Te Kamawa as well as world-leading scientists, mathematicians, and artists.

The university has stressed the cuts are proposed and not set in stone as the 90-day consultation continues. A spokesman said last week in response to the RCN's latest opposition: "As we’ve said previously it’s important to stress that these are proposals and there is still a great deal of detail to work through before any final decisions are made."

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