“Six, Three, Two! Shame On You!”
- editorinchief32
- Mar 17
- 4 min read
By Connor Bertie and Emma Thomson
A student-led rally was held on Campus Green this afternoon in protest against Principle O’Neal’s announcement to cut 632 jobs.
Chants of “six, three, two; shame on you!” could be heard echoing across the university today from a rageful and boisterous crowd, referring to the 632 announced redundancies. “Danger; Demolition in Progress” was the term used to advertise for the rally, encapsulating Dundee students’ feelings on the proposed university ‘recovery plan’.
“That is their language,” said student Presidential Candidate and organiser of the rally, Tánaiste Custance, “it’s a demolition job, not a recovery plan.”
More than 70 people showed up to the rally. Those present were staff, students, union workers, journalists and politicians: “I think it's an absolute outrage,” said Scottish Green MSP Maggie Chapman, referring to the 632 planned job cuts, “that the university executive group (UEG) think they can put forward a plan that has that many redundancies in it; given that it's not been academic staff, professional service staff, or student support staff who have caused this crisis”.
Chapman continued, “It is university mismanagement and potential misconduct, as well as financial mismanagement. It's absolutely outrageous that they think that they can make staff pay in this way. This is bigger than Timex. It's bigger than NCR.
It will be the biggest set of redundancies that Dundee has seen in over three decades.”
Today’s rally helped amplify student voices amidst the crisis, which some feel has not been considered throughout this period. One former student, Niamh said, “It’s a really unsustainable way to extend the length of this problem’.
One major proposal set forth by the UEG is the restructuring of our 8 schools into 3 faculties. A great resentment was heard roaring across campus green in spite of this.
“Restructuring is a time-honoured method that universities have used for ages, supposedly to save money,” continued Maggie Chapman,
“they think they can save money in places, cut jobs and courses in others, and it never works. You can bring in the hatchman, but you cannot actually solve mismanagement and the lack of good governance just by restructuring. That’s like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.”
Another point of protest was against the closure of the pantry, which has since been reinstated, but at only half its original strength. In addition, students now must ‘prove their desperation’ in order to access food items from the pantry.
“It's particularly shocking that in the case of the pantry, as it's overwhelmingly international students who have used it and who relied on it,” Tánaiste Custance pointed out. “For a university that has a bronze race equality charter award to pick a service to cut that is overwhelmingly used by international non-white students, I think says a lot about the university's actual commitment to anti-racism. I’m very glad to see that it's been partially restored.”
Referring to the student elections, Tánaiste Custance said: “so often we are taught to be feel powerless, to not use the opportunities that we have, to not use the power that we have.”
Niamh was straight to the point in her disgust, “the incumbent director is running again. He oversaw this crisis. How dare he put himself forward?” She said she hoped that the people who are elected are those “who really want to make good trouble” and be willing to “make change, stand up and be heard.”
On the point of how the crisis had affected student’s studies and the general morale around campus, Niamh stated, “I think students are really, really feeling like they're not being valued. Students want to be here to learn, but they also want to feel like they're part of an institution that cares about them.”
Adding to this, Niamh said, “it seems like the governance and accountability process has just completely failed, because either they didn't know and they announced it as soon as they knew, or they did know, that this was a long time coming, and they didn't say anything to students or staff. They've created not only the crisis itself, but also the situation of massive precarity and uncertainty.”
Speaking about the effect on the local economy in Dundee, Maggie Chapman said, “the city doesn't come back from this unscathed. The scars of these cuts will run deep for a very long time. You cannot expect the city economy to sustain over 600 redundancies and just carry on as normal. The university is an integral part of the city, and as such, we need to ensure that it is sustainable and healthy, and cutting up to a third of the workforce is not sustainable or healthy.”
As a final remark, Tánaiste spoke a word of warning to the UEG, that they should
“expect resistance, expect that people in this university, students and staff, are not going to accept the demolition of our university without a fight.”
Further events surrounding the financial crisis will be held this week. Tomorrow, a SRC meeting will be held at 6pm in the Dalhousie building, with invitations extended to Interim Principal Shane O’Neill and Vice President of Education Blair Grubb.
On Wednesday, the senior leaders of the university will give evidence to the education subcommittee of Parliament, this will be livestreamed in Dalhousie LT04. Students and staff have been encouraged to come.
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