UNION leaders have slammed Bradford College chiefs after they claimed £3.5 million of savings will be made from cutting staff.

Bosses at one of the country’s biggest colleges announced in November last year it had a £6 million budget shortfall and it was placed in a financial intervention scheme.

This involved inspectors from the Further Education Commissioner coming into the college to make suggestions as to how the institution could turn its financial difficulties around.

According to the University and College Union (UCU), £3.5 million will be saved by cutting members of staff.

Julie Kelley, regional officer for the UCU, said the union has questioned what is going on at the college when only two years ago 80 jobs were cut.

She said: “Up until recently we were talking to the college about a pay review because we thought they had finances to offer that, so we were really shocked when they went into financial intervention.

“We have questioned how they got into this financial mess and we are horrified at this latest round of redundancies after just a couple of years since the last one.

“Our members need these jobs and they are disgusted about what’s happened.”

Mrs Kelley added that 250 members of the UCU who work at the college attended a meeting about the cuts and voted in favour of the trade union writing to bosses and outlining that if there were any compulsory redundancies, industrial action would take place.

The union rep added that members also agreed that the management team should be reduced and not the ‘frontline staff’.

She added: “When the Further Education Commissioner produced his report, he said there was a very large management group at the college and given their financial difficulties they should look into reducing costs.

“As a union we thought the management team was large, so hearing the Commissioner say that was music to our ears.”

The college has previously blamed its financial woes on a 27 per cent “real terms” funding cut in higher education facilities since 2009 and lower than expected higher education students.

A spokesperson for Bradford College said: “We are unable to comment further until we have shared the detailed plans with staff, which will happen next week.”