The University of Bradford is to close its postgraduate programme in interpreting and translation in what could be a final blow for its modern languages department.

An e-petition which protests against the move and calls on Gordon Brown to intervene has attracted more than 1,500 signatures.

In 2003, faced with flagging recruitment, the university decided to subsidise the department for four years.

However, university bosses decided to halt undergraduate recruitment in 2006 and have now suspended recruitment to the masters programme. Academics say they are set to develop a new languages strategy and the structure of its language courses will be decided after that.

MA student Vanessa Rennie set up the petition calling on the Prime Minister to help save language courses in higher education as well as the Bradford course.

The petition says: "This petition concerns the UK's provision of language learning, and more specifically the future of the University of Bradford's Department of Languages and European studies.

"It has been proposed to halt recruitment to the MA course in Interpreting and Translation. The University of Bradford is one of only five universities within the UK which offers this course, and yet the university has decided to terminate this valuable course for financial reasons'."

Professor John Cusworth, dean of the School of Social and International Studies, said: "In recent years, there has been a major shift in the number of students studying languages at A-level and now GCSE.

"Demand for more traditional modern languages degrees is declining and consequently, the university is developing a more flexible type of language provision that will cater for the needs of students entering higher education in the next decade.

"In light of this, we have in the last year suspended recruitment to both undergraduate and postgraduate language courses.

"We are, however, committed to enabling students to study a modern language as part of their degree course through our Languages for All scheme. This provides six languages including Arabic, English (as a foreign language), French, German, Spanish and Russian for more than 250 students each semester.

"This scheme is open to undergraduate and postgraduate students, visiting and exchange students, university staff and members of the public interested in language learning."

The Association of University Professors and Heads of French has also expressed its concern over the move.

And a University and College Union spokesman said the closure of the MA would "inevitably lead to a de facto closure of the existing department".

"We've not yet been made aware of the initiation of a new staff reduction process in modern languages, but it is clearly only a matter of time," added the spokesman.