Joint Statement on London Met ‘Bankruptcy’ rumours from UNISON, UCU and LMSU
BBC Radio News reported on Saturday 25th September that London Met was one of three institutions at risk of bankruptcy (the others being Cumbria University and the University of Gloucestershire). A repeat report appeared on Sunday 26th in the Telegraph. We believe such reports are based on rumour, exaggeration and ill-informed inference drawn from well-worn stories that were already within the public domain.

In no case did the reports derive from any recent comments from the institutions themselves nor, to our knowledge, were the institutions requested to report on their financial health.

The timing of these stories is unlikely to be an accident. Coinciding with the start of a new academic year and in the run up to the Comprehensive Spending Review, the reports are at best irresponsible and at worst have been put forward by groups opposed to public funded education as disinformation intended to alarm staff and students currently at London Met or the other institutions and to discourage future students.

We believe such rumours are part of a much wider ‘softening-up’ of the public in an attempt to create an ‘inevitability’ around mass cuts to higher education provision and to justify the ideologically-driven encroachment of private sector for profit companies into higher education.

UCU, UNISON and the LMSU invite London Met management and all supporters of London Met to engage in a joint campaign by all supporters of London Met to make the case for fully funded Higher Education and in defence of institutions such as London Met that provide vital training and educational provision to what are highly diverse and culturally mixed local populations at a time of recession and increasing unemployment.

From Save London Met site