[News] Fwd: Redundancies at Newcastle Geography

[Katrin Singer]

-------- Weitergeleitete Nachricht --------
Betreff: 	Redundancies at Newcastle Geography
Datum: 	Fri, 16 May 2025 10:00:38 +0000
Von: 	Rachel Pain <0000e5dc0c0d3b8d-dmarc-request at JISCMAIL.AC.UK>
Antwort an: 	Rachel Pain <Rachel.Pain at NEWCASTLE.AC.UK>
An: 	GFGRG at JISCMAIL.AC.UK



Dear colleagues,
I’m writing to share the news that last week 21 geographers at Newcastle 
University were informed they were at risk of redundancy.
This affects 20 full Professors and one Principal Research Associate, as 
well as 9 Professors in Politics who are also in our School. The overall 
reduction sought is 3 FTE. These staff, who will spend the coming weeks 
applying for their own jobs and competing with each other, range from 
colleagues promoted to Professor last year to those with over 20 years 
of service at Newcastle and many in between. Each makes highly valued 
and vital contributions to our teaching, research and external 
engagement and is an integral part of our community.
This follows the loss of 7 Geography staff in the last 18 months, 
through voluntary severance, relocations and retirements. And we are not 
confident that further rounds of redundancies will not follow.
Targeting Professors in such a successful department, whether measured 
by research excellence or student recruitment and experience, or, seems 
a self-destructive act on the part of the University. But to be clear, 
we oppose any redundancies at any grade and view these as unnecessary 
and misguided.
We see this as the latest step in Newcastle University’s mismanaged 
attempt to reduce expenditures. Unlike other universities, Newcastle is 
not in deficit but has a strong cash and borrowing position. It has 
already achieved £15.8m of staff savings against its target of £20m, but 
despite resistance is now pressing ahead with compulsory redundancies - 
or “workforce resizing” - to save a further £3.8m.
We’re asking colleagues across Geography, in the UK and beyond, to share 
this news, and to contact our senior management team (below) to express 
opposition to the threat of these redundancies and the damage they will 
do to our students, our research, and the wider geographical 
community. In addition, if you have useful knowledge about the UK legal 
context around similar redundancies, please reach out to any of us who 
you know at Newcastle.
Contact details as follows:
Vice Chancellor - Professor Chris Day _chris.day at newcastle.ac.uk_ 
<mailto:chris.day at newcastle.ac.uk>
Deputy Vice Chancellor - Professor Nigel Harkness 
_nigel.harkness at newcastle.ac.uk_ <mailto:nigel.harkness at newcastle.ac.uk>
Chair of University Council Pat Ritchie _pat.ritchie at newcastle.ac.uk_ 
<mailto:pat.ritchie at newcastle.ac.uk>
Thankyou.
Rachel
Rachel Pain (she/her)
Dean of Social Justice
Professor of Human Geography
Newcastle Lead: Pro:NE (Postgraduate Research Opportunities North East) 
_Home -_ <https://www.pronortheast.org.uk/>
_Staff Profile | School of Geography, Politics and Sociology | Newcastle 
University_ <https://www.ncl.ac.uk/gps/staff/profile/rachelpain.html>
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<https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/edit/10.4324/9780429400346/critically-engaging-participatory-action-research-sara-kindon-rachel-pain-mike-kesby>
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