Unions fear that plans to merge Cranfield University with King’s College London will have an adverse effect on jobs and salaries, claiming they were “blindsided” by the announcement.
The coming together of the specialist postgraduate institution and the London giant was announced last week, in the second major merger agreed amid the sector’s financial crisis.
Staff at the London institution said they were unaware of any plans for a merger until they found out about it the morning before it was announced to the press.
Jamie Woodcock, chair of the KCL University and College Union (UCU) branch, said that the union had been in discussion with the university for the past year about its Strategy 2030 plan. However, in those discussions a proposed merger was never discussed, and he said the union felt “blindsided” by the announcement.
“We as a union have been trying to negotiate with them about this strategy but clearly there have been other plans that we haven’t been informed of. So I think people are quite shocked.”
